In 1895, a young German intellectual by the name of Arnold Genthe arrived in San Francisco and became fascinated by the city’s Chinatown, then called "Tangrenbu" (Port of the People of Tang). He produced around 200 images of Chinatown before going onto a career as a highly successful portrait photographer. Genthe’s photographs remain a rare collection that captures the rich street life of Old Chinatown before it was leveled by the 1906 San Francisco earthquake.
But his process of emphasis and omission proved highly problematic. While Genthe claimed insider status, his contact extended to tourist hot spots and he often hid to capture suspicious residents with his “candid camera.” He intentionally mislabeled certain images to make their content more palatable to his white patrons; for example one of vendors selling offal on a street cart was titled “The Fish Monger.” While Chinatown’s residents were predominantly male, two-thirds of his photographs depict children (who were easier to photograph and more appealing to his patrons), and over half of his images depict residents in ornate holiday dress as if they were daily clothing. Most shockingly, Genthe severely cropped and retouched his images, often scratching out English signs and white passersby, to communicate a more exotic representation of Chinatown. In all their detail and inauthenticity, Genthe’s photographs provide us a glimpse into the richness of the lost neighborhood and the stereotypes of the period.
1895年，一位名叫阿诺德·根特（Arnold Genthe）的年轻德国知识分子来到旧金山。他对该市的唐人街着迷，当时被称作“唐人埠”（唐人的港湾）。在成为一名非常成功的肖像摄影师之前，他拍摄了大约200张唐人街的照片。根特的照片是一个珍贵的收藏，他记录了老唐人街在1906年因旧金山地震而被夷为平地之前丰富的街头生活。
但是，他拍摄照片的重点与省略的部分被证明是非常有问题的。虽然根特自称他是唐人街自己人，但是他的关系却扩大到了热点旅游地区，而且他经常暗地里用他的“偷拍相机”捕捉可疑居民。他故意给某些图片贴上错误的标签，使它们的内容更能迎合他的白人顾客；例如，一个小贩在街上的手推车上卖动物内脏的图片被取名《鱼贩》。虽然唐人街的居民主要是男性，但他的照片中有三分之二是描绘儿童的（儿童更容易拍照，对他的顾客也更有吸引力），而超过一半的他的作品中描绘的是穿着华丽的假日服装的居民，就像是他们的日常装扮一样。最令人震惊的是，根特对他的照片进行了大幅度裁剪和修饰，经常删除英文标识和白人路人，以传达一种对唐人街更具异国情调的表现。然而，通过所有的这些细节和不真实性，根特的照片仍然让我们得以一窥这个被遗忘的社区的丰富性和那个时代的刻板印象。
Countdown to the TCS NYC Marathon on November 3, 2019: 216 Days.
2019年是美国第一条横贯大陆铁路建成150周年，为了纪念第一批华人来美建设这条铁路所做出的巨大贡献， MOCA将其2019 TCS NYC Marathon的活动命名为 MOCA Spike 150 – Running Forward With Our Stories！ 鼓励大家通过马拉松公益跑，全国线上接力，以及一天一个故事的方式讲述150个华人的历史故事，敬请大家持续关注， 讲出华人自己的故事，回顾过去，立足现在，展望未来，共同书写美国历史，使之更加充实完整。