The Second Child’s Second Child

Since 2023, I have been making a series of family portraits depicting people who were born as “second children” during the era of birth restrictions, now holding their own second child.

From the 1980s onwards, China implemented strict policies limiting family size. Regulations varied across regions and households, yet in many rural communities, the birth of a second child could still be treated as unauthorised. Some families concealed pregnancies and births, placed children temporarily with relatives, or paid substantial social maintenance fees. Many other pregnancies were terminated under the combined pressure of policy and family circumstances.

As China’s demographic structure, labour force, and birth rate changed, these restrictions were gradually relaxed, and families began to be encouraged to have more children. The generation whose births had once been restricted, concealed, or regarded as undesirable has now entered adulthood under a policy environment that encourages them to become parents again.

For this work, I photograph these adults holding their second children. Two generations of “second children” appear within the same image. The birth of the parent once represented risk, punishment, or resistance to state policy; decades later, the same position within the family has acquired a different social meaning.

The Second Child’s Second Child examines how public policy enters intimate family life and alters the meaning of birth, kinship, and personal identity over time. The children in these portraits do not yet understand this history, but their presence brings two opposing political and social expectations together within a single photograph.