©2009 John F Rash
Chinese migrants arrive in the large cities of Beijing and Shanghai daily to find their life and their dream. Many fail to realize the dream. Choosing to reside at the train station, migrants refuse to return to their home towns or relinquish the dream of finding a life in the city.
John Rash is a filmmaker, photographer, and visual artist based in Oxford, Mississippi. John earned his M.F.A. in Documentary and Experimental Art from Duke University and B.F.A. in Art Education from UNC-Greensboro, and now works as Assistant Professor of Film Production and Southern Studies at the University of Mississippi. His documentary films and photographs often focus on topics of identity, counter-culture communities, social justice, and environment and have been shown in festivals and museums around the world. John has received multiple awards for his documentary works including the Soul of Southern Film Award from Indie Memphis Film Festival for Negro Terror, History+ Best Documentary Award from the North Carolina Museum of History for Our Movement Starts Here, and an Emmy nomination for his film about South Carolina-based photographer Sam Wang. John is also the founder of the Southern Punk Archive which aims to preserve the stories of DIY punk communities in the American South. In 2025, John was an Artist in Residence at the Swatch Art Peace Hotel in Shanghai and a resident artist at Crosstown Arts in Memphis, TN in 2022.
