The New Along the River During the Qingming Festival

Dai Xiang    

With its total length of 25 meters, this work has cost three years and involved more than one thousand shots from its planning to completion. Based on Zhang Zeduan’s “Along the River During the Qingming Festival” in the 12th century , I made a complete transformation in terms of both characters and events. Relying on the present, my work intends to cross the boundaries of time and space by incorporating the typical phenomenon of China in the form of dramatic posing. Realistically, this work brings to the foreground the conflict between the imported Western culture and Chinese traditional worldviews since China’s reform and opening-up. Technically, I intended to violate the laws of optics, putting multiple perspectives together so as to create an in-depth panorama, with the emphasis on the layout of all details.

“I”, as a symbol, played various roles from all walks of life, both as an onlooker and a participant, indicating the inherent connection and conflict among all elements, experiencing all kinds of stories in the process of China’s modernization.

Sep, 2014