Lu Zhang

About

Lu is an MA Environmental Architecture graduate from the Royal College of Art (RCA). Prior to this, she got a first-class BA degree in Environmental Design from Tianjin Academic of Fine Arts (TAFA) in 2019 with First-class Scholarship of TAFA (2015-2018) and National Encouragement Scholarship (2016-2019). 

In the first two terms in RCA, Lu participated in the environmental architecture research of Indonesia driven by the Orang-orang & the Hutan Studio. During this period, her responsibility was to research humanity and territorial issues, including the territorial situation of colonialism, palm oil, deforestation, social media in Indonesia and edit the report book titled The Orang-orang and the Hutan: Lama, Kalimantan Barat, which is the collection of the studio’s term-one research outcomes. Moreover, she explored the data communication system of Indonesia and designed an open-source data online platform (Kitapeta) in Term 2.


Following her sustained interest in environmental architecture, urban study of urban villages and urban immigrants, spatial research, interdisciplinary study and gender space, Lu did the project "Female Fluid" in the latter two terms. This is a series of works about Chinese migrant women in urban villages, which was inspired by her studio work and field trip in Indonesia. She attempted to research urban close-proximity uneven development and migrant women’s urban issues, also she explored various research methods and media. Her film One Day was selected by Art and Design Education: FutureLab 2020 and exhibited from 6th December 2020 to 13 December 2020 in Shanghai, China.

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Degree Details

Statement

The topic of the project "Female Fluid" is about an ordinary, even socially marginalised group (rural-urban migrant women) and place (urban villages). It interprets young Chinese migrant women (20-29 years old) from the perspective of urbanisation and a space based case study of three migrant women (field research and co-drawing). It respectively researches their subject positions, spatial practices in everyday life and spatial cognition to prove that migrant women though is undertaking the oppression from the environment of urban villages and their social networks, their spatial actions have disruptive potential for the power structure and spatial order of the cities, especially the urban villages. And their cognition and tactics for their survival territory (villages) are different from migrant men and ordinary urban women, which reflects their unique perspective and wisdom. Therefore, under the context of the new Chinese old-housing renovation policy, urban migrant women’s spatial practices deserve to be paid attention to, and their spatial tactics are worth taking into the consideration in terms of urban village renovation. Instead of squeezing urban migrant women into a "collective" through data and general social survey, researching from their concerns of survival and territorial issues and accessing them by means of anthropology and participatory research may be able to better respect their individual differences and get more profound first-hand material directly. It is of great significance to improve the gender sensitivity in urban village renovation and further discuss the social environment of urban villages.

I attempt to provide a new access to the future renovation of urban villages through this information and data from first-hand surveys, this is also my comprehensive reflection on the theories of Lefebvre, Foucault, De Certeau, etc. In addition to critically reflecting on centralised decision-making (such as urban planning), perhaps more attention should be paid to the more humane dimensions of space and environment rather than blinding to the truth haughty and naive. So I chose the research process combining “top-to-down” and “down-to-top”. This inspired all planners to focus on the migrant women who had always been marginalised. Their participation and voice is a challenge to the established traditions and norms, also will partly break the stereotypes like "this is what it should be". Even if these challenges are not enough to shake the macro structure, they are also encouraging and can dispel some of the pessimism that pervades in society. Perhaps as an architect or planner we should no longer be obsessed with drawing the beauty from “god's perspective”, or immersed in the satisfaction of creating by abstract thinking, but should really go downstairs until to the “ground floor”, and humbly learn the easily ignored knowledge from reality.

Research Background

Situation of Domestic Migration in China
Situation of Domestic Migration in China — China has the world's largest number of domestic migrants, with more than 100 million female migrants in 2019. The map on the left shows the one-day domestic migration trend on March 5, 2020, with my research site, Guangzhou in southern China becoming the country’s third most populated city after Beijing and Shanghai. But the difference is that most of the immigrants in Guangzhou are from the countryside to the city. So this means that this group is much more likely to be ignored than the ordinary females. The chart on the right shows a case study of the village in Guangzhou city. The study shows that the current immigrants in Guangzhou mainly live in the dormitory and shared-flat, which is located in the urban village. The study also focused on children in urban villages and helping migrants integrate into urban villages, but overlooked a larger and more stressful group: women. This chart mainly reflects the serious lack of standardised management of urban villages.
Urbanisation and Urban Village Types of Guangzhou
Urbanisation and Urban Village Types of Guangzhou — The two maps show the land use of Guangzhou and the types of urban villages in Guangzhou, which are mainly distributed in the old urban areas in the central part of the city. There is a very contradictory urban scene here, which has the largest population and the highest GDP, but the environment and living conditions of the urban villages here are relatively poor. The urban area of Guangzhou initially only included the old city. As time went by, urbanisation gradually expanded to the surrounding areas, thus developing to the current city size. Therefore, urban villages in the old city have a long history of development and gather more rural immigrants.
Development Process of Urban Villages in Guangzhou
Development Process of Urban Villages in Guangzhou — This map mainly shows the transformation of urban villages in the past 30 years. In China, the urbanisation process is not average but can only be carried out in stages, which leads to the lag in the development of many villages in the city. By the end of the last century, the good opportunities in the city had attracted many migrants from the surrounding countryside, and industrial areas had been set up around the city. By early 2000, urban villages in the city centre were transformed or moved to the edge of the city, which was the first group of urban villages to be transformed. There are some top-down urban planning areas around the city, which have attracted a lot of people in the surrounding villages. By around 2012, the urbanisation of the old city of Guangzhou has been relatively mature, and the urbanisation scope has become larger, and a number of urban centres have appeared. Around each city centre, there are also some relatively mature urban villages, which can be defined as urban villages 2.0 or urban villages 3.0. Therefore, in order to understand the latest life of migrant women in the urban villages, the urban villages near the city centre will be further studied.

Since its 1978 socio-economic reformation, China has witnessed one of the fastest periods of urbanisation in human history. The consequent shifts of labour and migrants, accompanied by the changing nature of rural land, have resulted in the formation of urban villages – villages that are surrounded by significant and modern urban establishments. Appearing in the downtown segments of major cities of China, these urban villages have been a unique feature that both formed part of China’s urbanisation efforts and nurtured many social, environmental, and economic challenges. Many new migrants from rural to urban areas would locate themselves as tenants in these villages, enjoying affordable housing at the expenses of suffering from squalor, overcrowding, safety and social problems. The background research examines these issues based on the circumstance of Guangzhou, China.

Medium: Mapping / Illustration

Size: 530mm x 280mm

Field Research in Guangzhou

Photography Map of Field Trip
Photography Map of Field Trip — Tianhe District, as the most prosperous district of Guangzhou, contains multiple typical urban villages. The urban villages here exist with the obvious close-proximity uneven development phenomenon, so I chose this district as the research site. In addition, the urban villages in the south of this district have been basically transformed to modern urban communities, which do not have much development possibilities. So I chose to do field research in the north of this district. This map is based on the photo collection taken in my field trip. Each rectangle in the diagram represents a photo taken in the field trip, and the color of the rectangle is the main color of the photo. The number of photographs of different areas indirectly reflects the sensitivity of the environmental building perspective to different areas. The colors in the photos of different areas reflect the dominant tone of the environment in that area. Visualising the difference between different areas can stimulate the reader's imagination of space.
Research Samples
Research Samples — The diagram on the left shows the three stages of rural-urban female migration. The first layer shows the process of women moving from rural to urban life, from agricultural life to urban industrial life, due to factors such as job, policy and marriage. The second layer shows immigrant women in the early stage of urban life, suffering from material, cultural level, living habits, national policies and other oppression. The third layer shows that after a long period of urban village life, immigrant women have gradually found their own specific life mode. They are neither urban people nor rural people, but they have established a certain relationship with both urban and rural people, and with their special living environment and architecture. For the research, I selected 3 different types of migrant women living in urban villages (Tiantian Tang -- migrant worker, Zhenfeng Chen -- shop owner and Simin Yang -- second migrant generation).

Launch Project
Space-time Cube of the Three Migrant Women
Space-time Cube of the Three Migrant Women — As Tang went home, she was called to go to work. She then again took a 1-hour bus ride from her village to the workplace, which was marked on the bottom-center of the map. It was supposed to be a day-off for her, just like her husband. However, she would almost immediately take the job because her income was counted by the day that she worked. What was surprising was that she went grocery shopping and ran daily errands as soon as she returned from a 6-hour shift, on top of a 2-hour bus-ride. The GPS data shows that Tang would give up for day-off to earn extra income for the family, and still she would take her normal household responsibility even though she was busy and her husband was relatively free. Having little time left for herself, she almost went nowhere else on that day. She never made any decisions to make her day easier, either. She did everything that she was expected to do; she took a voluntary sacrifice unconsciously because she was used to considering other family members over herself, and she showed almost no resistance to such an arrangement. However, it was also interesting to know if she took the randomly called-in work as a way to escape the urban village. After all, the pay on that day was so little that it made no sense for her to go through all the hustles of the long-haul bus ride. As for Chen, the distance she travelled was the shortest among the three women. She almost strictly stayed in the urban village throughout the day. She went to her shop in the morning and took her son with her. When the shop was not busy, she drove her son to a movie theatre not far away from the village. However, she would constantly remind her son to watch the traffic even if there was no car coming; she seems to have an illusional idea of bad road safety inside the village when her son was present. In Yang’s GPS data , the avoidance of her living space is identical. She would travel on a taxi for a far distance, reaching where she considers as “urban”, and spend a whole day there. She escaped three meals from home, and spent very little time around the family.
Distribution and Daily Schedule of the Women Living in Kemulang Village
Distribution and Daily Schedule of the Women Living in Kemulang Village — After my field trip in Guangzhou, I put the collected data into this diagram. This chart shows the approximate proportion of female characters in her village, as well as the origin of immigrants in her village. As well as the daily element timeline for women living in this urban village. I found that almost all women in urban villages were responsible for most of the household chores, even though some women had their own jobs or were very old. This is actually influenced by the traditional rural life mode. These women, especially the elder, housewife and the store owner, spend most of their time in the village. So they have more say in the environmental and spatial conditions of urban villages. At the same time, I found that in crowded urban villages, they also lacked entertainment space and public sharing space. The sketches on the right are two typical examples of an urban village environment. In order to occupy more space, women in villages in some urban villages transform their living and business space, some of which are effective, while others result in crowded space and poor environmental conditions.
Oppression Network of the Three Migrant Women
Oppression Network of the Three Migrant Women — This is my summary of the stress sources of the three immigrant women, which in fact shows their social networks. By summarising, I found that the elements in the network were the main objects of daily interaction of these immigrant women. This network and their daily practices make up their living environment. On the contrary, the urban village environment also influences their social networks and practices. In the field trip, I pay special attention to the phenomenon that the gender difference in urban villages is almost disappearing. There is not much difference between the dressing, behavior and practice of these immigrant women and men in urban villages. And they not only have to do the childbearing and housework responsibilities that traditional women take on, but also have to support their families. This phenomenon is reflected in my films. But I also want to study the causes of this phenomenon from the perspective of environment and architecture.
Photographs of the Urban Villages and Migrant Women in Guangzhou
Photographs of the Urban Villages and Migrant Women in Guangzhou

Launch Project

The research chooses 3 urban villages with different developmental degrees as case studies for more in-depth fieldwork research. The research sites are selected from Guangzhou which has many typical urban villages and a large amount of rural-to-urban migrants. After the research sites are determined, I divide migrant females into 3-5 representative groups, and screen out 3 different migrant women in urban villages for follow-up investigation. There are 4 factors considered: age, occupation, family structure, interpersonal networks and social network (preferred to diverse social groups). After carefully selecting cases, the in-depth field research is carried out by observational method (natural observation / controlled observation), interview (open-structured interview / semi-structured interview) and story-telling aiming to investigate the basic situation of the researched urban villages as well as the factors influencing migrant women's interaction, experiences, perceptions and psychology. The emphasis is placed on the elements of spatial morphology, the production of space, socio-spatial practices, spatial assemblages, public/private space, infrastructure, psychology, cultural ethics, social networks and capital. The purpose of the interview is to gain a deep understanding of their cognition and demand for space, as well as the oppression and resistance they are facing in the urban village, through acquiring the daily practice and activity tracking of the investigated women.

Medium: Mapping / Illustration / Photography / Interview / Diary

Size: 357mm x 297mm

Film - One Day

One Day — The film One Day uses montage editing to record the “one day” of three immigrant women living in two urban villages in Guangzhou. It records the city, environment, architecture and their everyday lives through the lens of the three young women, which shows how they choose to live their lives when facing various issues.

The film One Day uses montage editing to record the “one day” of three immigrant women living in two urban villages in Guangzhou. It records the city, environment, architecture and their everyday lives through the lens of the three young women, which shows how they choose to live their lives when facing various issues.

Medium: Film

Size: 17:55 min

In Collaboration with:

  • Photographer-SSSSwagger
    The film One Day was created by collaborating with SSSSwagger, who is the contract photographer of National Geographic and DJI Innovation.

Co-drawing Experiment

Stop-motion Film of Co-drawing Experiment — This is a stop-motion film recording the process of co-drawing experiment. The participatory research is specifically implemented by co-drawing. First, I conducted an online interview with Tang, Chen and Yang about their living environment in the urban villages, including private space and public space and extracted the key spaces mentioned in their description. Then I showed the three immigrant women and their husbands or boyfriends the photos of the key spaces, and asked them to rate (1-10) each space according to their preferences, also to mark anything they like or dislike. According to the feedback from each participant in the first co-drawing, I modified the photos through Photoshop, the purpose of which is to make the participants not be disturbed by the existing spatial order in the second painting, so that they could play more. In the second co-drawing, I encourage them to try their best to express their opinions on space renovation with paintings instead of words (the scope of renovation references the National Urban Old Building Renovation in 2020). Compared with the written description, the painting can visualise the participants' understanding and preferences of the urban villages more intuitively, and it is more readable without the limitation of language. Finally, I interviewed the participants again about their views on the renovated space and their reasons for doing so.
Co-drawing
Co-drawing — According to the 170 drawings, I found that, compared with migrant men, the three migrant women pay more attention to safety, privacy and aesthetics. Compared with the urban women, the drawings of migrant women may lack beauty and innovation, but some of their tactics based on their experiences would improve spatial practicability. And migrant women tend to take family into consideration. Moreover, based on their social networks in the urban villages, they often take other neighbors into consideration, which can possibly make their proposals more feasible. In the co-drawing experiment, no matter the three migrant women or the three migrant men, they all hoped to improve the living environment from various aspects. However, in reality, they all made a compromise in the co-drawing, that is, they chose not to demolish any building in the urban villages, even if the high building density reduces the public spaces and indoor daylighting.

The construction of environment or architecture should be given to the professional or shall return the initiative to the occupants is a controversy worth thinking about. Doshi’s proposal of merging architecture and lifestyle provides a research angle for environmental architecture that attaches great importance to the occupants’ usage of the territory. The Participation may be an opportunity to hear the ordinary people’ voice for urban villages, and also an opportunity for the wisdom of the masses to be valued and recognised. Therefore, I hope to play a role of spatial agency based on my previous understanding of urban villages and the three migrant women. On the one hand, it helps me to explore their understanding of urban villages, on the other hand, it helps migrant women to enhance their cognition of environment and architecture.

Having three women who are distinctive from each other gives luxury to this research in terms of discovering the complexity and individual differences of migrant women living in urban villages. As noted earlier, Tang, Chen and Yang are very similar in terms of age (25-26 years), education level (secondary school graduates), and city life experience (exclusively within urban villages). However, they are different in regards to migration motives, lengths of post-migration life, family structures, financial situations, professions, circles of friends, and lifestyle. As such, my pre-experiment interviews with them provided interesting data and generated a rough idea of the most concerned aspect in their daily lives. Similar to their backgrounds, the answers that the three participants provided can be clearly divided into two categories; that is, they appear to have homogeneous concerns and different locus of interests when it comes to their opinions about the urban villages that they live in. These answers were checked against participants’ husbands, who gave distinctive perspectives on the same issues.

In the two phases of co-drawing experiments, the three women participants, their husbands and three ordinary urbanites （due to privacy concerns, I only invited urban women to participate in the painting of the public space in the urban village. The co-drawing experiment involved 30 Spaces.）respectively applied data that can be cross-referenced with the interview transcripts. For the two-phases co-drawing experiments, a total of 182 drawings were received as feedback. In doing so, individual preferences towards living space inside urban villages become available, which reveals the specific needs of migrant women.

Medium: Stop-motion Film / Photography / Painting

Size: 1:09 min / 420mm x 891mm

Seminar

Putting Migrant Women into Environmental Justice Frame: A Case Study of Rural-to-urban Migrant Women in the Urban Village in Guangzhou, China
Putting Migrant Women into Environmental Justice Frame: A Case Study of Rural-to-urban Migrant Women in the Urban Village in Guangzhou, China

Launch Project

Population migration is a crucial factor for sustainable development. The diversity and vulnerability of female migrants in addressing environmental issues such as climate change is a huge challenge to promote environmental justice. When discussing gender, migration and environmental issues at the same time, the typicality and diversity of the impacts of climate change and environmental issues are more clearly reflected in these vulnerable groups. This research discusses environmental justice through the lens of a particular urban group——Chinese rural-urban migrant women living in urban villages, which indeed integrates gender and migration into environmental issues. Migrant women from rural to urban areas are undertaking a double oppression of social class and gender, especially during the outbreak of COVID-19, the impact of which comes from environmental injustice is more pronounced. However, as the product of social injustice, the contradiction, difference and vulnerability of migrant female groups are often ignored by various fields, especially the environmental field. Therefore，refocusing on this group from an environmental justice perspective is a necessary strategy to promote social justice and to address gender and hierarchy issues.

Medium: Report