Title: The Gaze
Medium: Photography
Date: November 15 ,2023
Photo Source: Internet
Post-Production Software: Adobe Photoshop, Adobe Lightroom
Location: Nanjing,Jiangsu,China

I didn't actually take these photos, but I downloaded them from the school's official publicity platform and post-processed them.
I searched for "canteen" and got these very similar photos. I didn't filter them, so I can say that there is no difference between them.
These photos were taken in 2015-2023. Times have changed a lot, but the way we treat others has hardly changed. A friend of mine once told me that he felt that Chinese people are very cold by nature, that they only care about their family and friends, but not about strangers, or people in the service industry. People often lament the rapid development and convenience of life in China, but in my opinion, this is basically based on our very cheap labour.
The canteen staff as people we basically meet every day, but we don't know each other's names and we never make small talk. All we did was state our needs. The detachment and indifference that characterises this urban life makes it seem like we see nothing even when we do see each other.

这些照片实际上并不是我拍摄的，而是我从学校官方宣传平台上下载，后期处理而来。
我搜索“食堂”，于是得到了这些非常相似的照片。我也并没有进行筛选，可以说他们本质上并没有什么区别。
这些照片拍摄于2015-2023。时代变了很多，我们对待别人的方式却几乎未曾改变。我有一个朋友曾经对我说：他感觉中国人本质上非常冷漠，人们只关心自己的家人、朋友，却对陌生人，服务业人员漠不关心。常常有人感慨中国发展之迅速，生活之便利，但在我看来，这些基本都是建立在我们十分廉价的劳动力上。
食堂的工作人员作为我们基本上每天都会见的人，但我们却不知道对方的名字，也从不闲聊。我们所做的就只是说明自己的需求而已。这种都市生活特有的疏离与冷漠使得我们即便看见了对方，也像什么都没有看到。