Shanghai and New York, Face to Face in a Single Frame
A First Encounter, Fixed in One Frame
At The Peninsula New York, Shanghai and New York are brought together through a rare photographic encounter: the Polaroid 20×24.
West Meets East · Shanghai & New York 2026 presents a visual dialogue between two global cities through large-format instant photography. On view from June 29 to July 5, 2026, the exhibition uses the Polaroid 20×24 process to capture people, skylines, waterways, streets, and urban memories from Shanghai and New York.
Centered around this extraordinary photographic process and supported by the ArtShelf platform for cross-cultural exchange, photographers from both cities have continued to collaborate and engage in dialogue, ultimately giving rise to this trans-Pacific exhibition.
For American photographer Ben Fraternale, the exhibition grew from a first encounter with Shanghai. In September 2025, he traveled to China for the first time. Over two weeks, he moved through the city’s streets, analog photography communities, traditional opera stages, artists’ studios, and everyday scenes. Together with documentary filmmaker Henry Thong, he later turned this experience into Inside China, a documentary that introduced overseas viewers to a vivid and human image of Shanghai.
That sense of encounter gives the exhibition its emotional center.
The Chinese title, “Zhaomian” — or “Face to Face”— carries two meanings. It refers to a portrait fixed by the camera. It also refers to the moment when people meet and begin to know one another. In this exhibition, the two meanings become inseparable. To make a portrait is also to begin a conversation.
The exhibition brings together 50 Polaroid works, including 20 large-format 20×24 peel-apart photographs and 30 instant photographs. The works move between individual faces and urban scenes: young opera performers, inheritors of traditional crafts, artists, analog photography enthusiasts, city residents, neighborhoods, architecture, metro systems, and daily life. Together, they present Shanghai not as a distant idea, but as a city made visible through people, movement, craft, and memory.
Among the works, a group portrait of 30 people from different professions, generations, and backgrounds serves as one of the exhibition’s central threads. Veteran photographers, traditional craft inheritors, artists, film photography lovers, and ordinary workers appear in the same image. Their shared presence reflects a simple idea: a city is not only built by skylines and systems, but also by the people who live, work, remember, and create within it.
Three photographers shape the exhibition’s view of the two cities. John Reuter, successor to the New York 20×24 Studio legacy, captures the artistic spirit of New York. Jesse Lin, founder of the Shanghai 20×24 Studio, records Shanghai from a local perspective. Ben Fraternale returns to Shanghai as a first-time visitor and observer. Their works form a visual bridge between the Hudson and the Huangpu, with ArtShelf supporting two-way cultural exchange.
Three photographers and three distinct ways of seeing come together across four thematic chapters: People, Gesture / Chorus, Water / Metro, and Skylines. The structure moves from portrait to cityscape, from cultural practice to urban infrastructure, and from individual memory to shared urban experience. Shanghai and New York are not simply placed side by side. They are allowed to look at one another.
A live Polaroid 20×24 experience forms a key part of the New York presentation. One of the world’s rare remaining 20×24 cameras is used on site to create group portraits of guests. The shooting, developing, and unveiling happen in the exhibition space, turning photography into a shared act of witnessing. Nearly one hundred guests from the cultural, artistic, photographic, and public cultural fields of China and the United States attended the opening, many watching the image emerge at close range.
The exhibition is part of Our Water: Flowing from Shanghai — Intercultural Dialogues among World Cities, a five-year initiative that connects major waterfront cities through cultural exchange. Following previous seasons in Paris and London, the 2026 Shanghai-New York season continues the dialogue across the Pacific.
After its New York presentation, the exhibition will travel to Shanghai in November 2026, where it will be shown at the Cultural Corridor inside People’s Square Metro Station.
Two cities. Two rivers. One rare camera. In Face to Face, the meeting becomes an image — and the image becomes a shared memory.
Exhibition Information
Exhibition Title: West Meets East · Shanghai & New York 2026 Dates: June 29 – July 5, 2026 Venue: The Peninsula New York Shanghai Tour: November 2026, Cultural Corridor, People’s Square Metro Station, Shanghai
Organizers: Shanghai International Culture Association, Fraternale Productions LLC, New York 20×24 Studio Special Support: Shanghai Shentong Metro Group Presented by: Shanghai 20×24 Studio, ArtShelf (Shanghai) Co., Ltd., The Peninsula New York
Media Contact
Company Name: ArtShelf (Shanghai) Co., Ltd
Contact Person: Vanessa
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City: Shanghai
Country: China
Website: www.art-shelf.org
