In the background, layers of black bags of sand form a cofferdam — an enclosure built within a body of water to allow the enclosed area to be pumped out — on the fringe of a parcel of reclaimed land intended for the planned second airport in Xiamen, southern China. | The prosperous southern coastal city of Xiamen started in 2016 to reclaim land in preparation to build a controversial second airport on Dadeng Island, a 13 square kilometer island on the border of Xiamen and Kinmen island which belongs to Taiwan. When the airport is completed on reclaimed land, the size of Dadeng island will have doubled. The plans are that by 2025, the airport will have two runways, and be able to serve 45 million passengers per year. Right now, highways and subways connecting Xiamen and Dadeng Island are under construction. Although it’s widely reported that the airport is scheduled to be operational by 2020, there is at present no evidence that the central government and the military have given the final approval to the construction of the airport.
“They emerge out of nowhere. Culturally, aesthetically, geologically, ecologically, architecturally. They possess no foundation and little fundament. Some of them stand unfinished, defeated by the whim of a politician or the tremor of global financial markets. For artificial islands don’t stand for anything but the perspective of quick economic profits and the mirage of luxury living.” – Justinien Tribillon
Magnum Photos is featuring the newest work I’ve produced for “Shifting Sands” – a project I’ve been working on since 2017 about the global depletion of sand. The new work focuses on land reclamation in China: Phoenix Island, Ocean Flower Island, Sun and Moon Bay – artificial spaces built with a dwindling resource. Justinien Tribillon wrote about the project and about the new photographs published in this piece, many of which are being shown for the first time.
A piece of artificial land shimmers in the sun, as seen from traditional fishing boats on a real coast on Dadeng island in Xiamen, southern China. | The prosperous southern coastal city of Xiamen started in 2016 to reclaim land in preparation to build a controversial second airport on Dadeng Island, a 13 square kilometer island on the border of Xiamen and Kinmen island which belongs to Taiwan. When the airport is completed on reclaimed land, the size of Dadeng island will have doubled. The plans are that by 2025, the airport will have two runways, and be able to serve 45 million passengers per year. Right now, highways and subways connecting Xiamen and Dadeng Island are under construction. Although it’s widely reported that the airport is scheduled to be operational by 2020, there is at present no evidence that the central government and the military have given the final approval to the construction of the airport.
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You will find the entire piece “A Mirage of Luxury Built on Sand” here.
You can read more about Shifting Sands in Singapore, Malaysia and China here.
This project was supported by the Pulitzer Center for Crisis Reporting.
