Inspiration

In 2010, he had a well-paid job in the sales department of an internet company, but had also just been diagnosed with depression and had begun to avoid enclosed spaces like elevators, as well as lose his appetite.

He decided to quit and took up photography as a hobby, and also started searching for information about vintage cameras online. While browsing a bulletin board system, he came across a series of photos, including a photo of a foreign family, that had been on the film left inside a Rollei 35 S compact camera that the netizen who had uploaded the photos had bought secondhand.

"Although it wasn't a good photo, the family photo fascinated me for no obvious reason. It made me cry; I didn't know why," Zhang says, adding that he later downloaded the photos to his computer.

Two years later, Zhang decided to search for the people in the photo, and reposted the images on micro-blogging platform Sina Weibo. Through a license plate number, the photo was identified as having been taken in Braunschweig in Germany.

With the help of a translator, Zhang emailed media outlets in Braunschweig. A local radio station got interested in the story and a newspaper followed up with a report. Within hours it had made headlines, and soon after, the newsroom received a phone call from someone who claimed to be the child in the photo.

Confirming that the family photo had been taken in 1984, Zhang asked the person if they could send him a new family photo. When he got it, he immediately sensed the power of time — the photo contained some new people, while some from the original were missing.

"The old family photo helped me to find motivation, which inspired me to start my project capturing moments from the lives of strangers on film," Zhang says.

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