IF YOU GO

"Fading Hutongs: Julio De Matos," Through This Lens Gallery, 303 E. Chapel Hill St., Durham through Nov. 14. Gallery hours are 10:30 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. Tuesday-Friday, and 10:30 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturdays. For information, call 687-0250.

"Chinese Paper Sculpture: Artistic Creations," Turning Point Gallery, University Mall, Chapel Hill, through Dec. 31. Hours are Monday to Saturday 10 a.m. to 9 p.m. and Sunday 1 p.m. to 6 p.m. For information, call 967-0402.

In the wake of the 2008 Olympics, Beijing, China, implemented urban renewal with a vengeance. The neighborhoods marked for destruction are called hutongs with their siheyuan (a courtyard surrounded by four buildings). On a visit to Beijing in 2005, Portuguese photographer and architect Julio de Matos became aware of these village-like areas that still exist in a city filled with wide avenues and high-rise buildings.

It was obvious to him the way of life these enclaves represented could not last and, as a photographer, he felt compelled to record them before they all disappeared.

Over three years he saw the hutongs, their markets and their residents almost smothered by encroaching apartment buildings. Today, some have been designated as historic neighborhoods and the value of the real estate has skyrocketed. Many are tourist oddities, and rickshaw tours are on every visitor's itinerary.

The exhibition comes out of a book Matos created about this fading phenomenon. The book begins with photographs of two temples that dominate the skyline of Beijing. It continues with aerial views of tightly packed rooftops and then what these communities look like on the ground and inside the spaces. The houses face out onto a courtyard, generally south for the sun. As we move through the gallery, the areas open and we see at least one healthy tree, signs on peeling walls, parked bicycles, clothing hanging out to dry and the dichotomy of modernity on one hand and old-fashioned ideas on the other. In one telling picture, three men stand around a motorbike under a tree as a woman, rolling a handmade bamboo cart with two children inside, walks toward them. Inside the houses we see sparsely furnished bedrooms and the ubiquitous television.

And then Matos shows us people. White-haired women, dressed in slacks and patterned blouses, a man feeding a caged bird in a courtyard filled with potted plants, a husband and wife standing shoulder to shoulder, old buddies playing a board game in the yard, and portraits of young, middle-aged and elderly men all posing for the photographer. Two young men, wearing hard hats, smile at us as they take time out from their demolition. An old lady, dressed against the cold, sits on an abandoned chair surrounded by rubble and signs of destruction.

In the 20th century every city in the world went through some sort of urban redevelopment, and Durham was no exception. Durham's city fathers replaced shacks and outside toilets with low-rise projects and found out that decent plumbing could not make up for the loss of communities where neighbors knew each other. It is the same in China.

The traditional hutong was too confining for many of the young Chinese who left for the modern world outside their walls years before the Olympics, but those who remained have now been forced out of their neighborhoods into high-rise anonymous buildings. China has no choice: with a population that continually grows, there is not enough land to take care of its people, so apartments soar skyward. Matos joins a number of documentary photographers who have taken on China's changing urban landscape. It seems to me he has an edge; he photographs with an eye for the majestic, an understanding of small detail and an instinctual sympathy for the beauty of the past.

In a totally separate but related show is the Chinese paper sculpture exhibit in Chapel Hill. Paper cutting is a traditional art that evolved in China around the invention of paper during the Han dynasty (206 BCE-221CE). Paper was precious, so cutting it into an art object was available as a pastime only to the women of the royal palaces and houses of nobility. Over the centuries, the art form became an integral part of everyday life. The craft, however, almost disappeared in the 20th century and has only recently been revived. In the exhibition the images are unbelievably intricate and beautiful; birds and flowers seem to be favorites of the artisans. A very special one is a scene of a hutong, completely cut, pasted and three dimensional. It is a Matos photograph in another medium.

We used to call China the sleeping giant; the giant is now awake. We are going to have to share the world with its people, so we had better know everything we can about them. Seeing these exhibitions is a start.

Blue Greenberg's column appears each week in Entertainment and More. She can be reached at blueg@bellsouth.net or by writing her in c/o The Herald-Sun, P.O. Box 2092, Durham, NC 27702.