Depending on the day, Matthew Niederhauser can be an artist, photojournalist or videographer. Nomenclature is a shifty entity where he lives in China. He is open to any work and also fancies himself an adept writer with an eye for the absurd. His photography has appeared in The New Yorker, National Geographic, New York Magazine, Newsweek, Guardian Observer, Le Monde, GEO France, The New York Times, The New York Times Magazine, Foreign Policy, The Wall Street Journal and Time Magazine amongst others. More importantly, Matthew Niederhauser is not always so bizarrely situated as shown and finds writing about himself in the third-person more than disconcerting.
Matthew can be reached at mdn@mdnphoto.com with any questions, concerns or work inquiries.
Matthew is represented by the INSTITUTE for Artist Management.
Solo Shows:
2009 powerHouse Arena – New York City – Sound Kapital: Beijing’s Music Underground
2009 Proud Galleries – London – Gilded
2009 Govinda Gallery – Washington – Sound Kapital: Beijing’s Music Underground
Group Shows:
2011 ME Contemporary – Copenhagen – Grand Opening 2.0
2011 Noorderlicht Fotofestival – Groningen – “Metropolis: City Life in the Urban Age”
2009 Noorderlicht Forofestival – Groningen – “The Pursuit of Happiness”
Awards/Talks:
2012 Sound Kapital Night – Carriageworks – Sydney – Sound Kapital Slideshow
2011 New York Photo Festival – Brooklyn – “Audio/Visual” – Sound Kapital
2011 Fotoweek DC Nightvisions Winner – Washington – Night Walker
2011 Royal Asiatic Society Speaker – Shanghai – Counterfeit Paradises
2010 “This Is Beijing” Speaker – China Academy of Fine Arts (CAFA) – Gilded
2010 Caochangdi Photo Spring: Arles in Beijing – Night Event – Sound Kapital Slideshow
2010 PDN Photo Annual Finalist – Personal Project Category – Tuanjiehu: An Urban Oasis
2010 UCCA “China Stories” Speaker – Ullens Center for Contemporary Art – Gilded
2009 Washington Fotoweek Speaker – Corcoran Gallery of Art – Gilded
2009 Px3 – Honorable Mention – Sound Kapital
2009 PDN Summer Music Moment – Winner “Spontaneous Moment” Category – Screaming into the Void
Bio:
Matthew Niederhauser’s involvement with Asia and photography first started in high school with four straight years of Chinese courses and late nights in the darkroom. Greatly inspired by his language teacher’s own dramatic background during the Cultural Revolution in China, he became fascinated with the country’s expansive history and philosophical traditions and spent a year living with a host family in Beijing in 2000.
After his first year in Asia, Matthew commenced his studies at Columbia University where he immersed himself in the anthropology department and drew strongly from his first-hand experience in China. This led to many more trips across Asia and, eventually, thesis research on urban development and the role of cultural tourism in integrating rural communities into central economic systems in western Tibet. During this period Matthew also began taking classes at the International Center of Photography in New York. After graduating from college in 2006, he split time between researching for the National Committee on US-China Relations and assistant teaching at the International Center of Photography before heading back to Beijing to fully commit himself to long-term documentary projects and other artistic endeavors.
Since then, Matthew’s work covering youth culture and urban development in China has appeared in The New Yorker, Le Monde, National Geographic, Guardian Observer, The New York Times, The New York Times Magazine, Foreign Policy, The Wall Street Journal and Time Magazine amongst others. He also published with powerHouse Books a 175-page, hardcover book entitled Sound Kapital consisting of his portraiture and concert photography of Beijing’s underground music scene. Otherwise, Matthew concentrates on two projects entitled “Gilded” and “Counterfeit Paradises” that investigate urban development and concomitant consumer trends. These are his main outlets for exploring the rapid socioeconomic changes in China.
