When viewing Yang’s photographic works at a distance, they are dreamlike Shanshui paintings. Up close, they become shockingly modern city views.  The scenes of construction sites, large cranes, traffic signs and fly-overs, that all Shanghai citizens are so familiar with, have become critical elements in his artworks. These common objects can be found everywhere in Shanghai and yet Yang Yongliang has arranged them to fit into the traditional Chinese Paintings' composition.  Yang perfectly handles the contradictions between the ephemeral and solid, the vigorous and gentle, the sparse and bold, the beautiful and ugly: whilst the entire pictures are poetically harmonious, the details are the 'blots on the landscape'.