SHORTS: “Diving into the Inner World” (total: 99 min)
24 February 2024@BLOC
The inner world of women is like a maze. They have no fixed shape just like water, but they can gradually unite together to form an unimaginable power that can break through all restraints.
Step Into the River (Ma Weijia, 15min,2020)
A story about two girls who survived. One was born because her elder brother died; it was luck from natural choice; The other was saved when she was abandoned by her biological parents; it was a man-made result. But no matter what reason they survived, they all feel inferior for their own existence. The two girls cherished each other, and their friendship gave them the strength to live.
Weijia MA
Weijia MA is an independent animation artist, also a college teacher. Her documentary short film “MY QUARANTINE BEAR” has won the Special Mention at Vision du Réel. “STEP INTO THE RIVER” has won the Best Animation Short at Palm Springs International Shortfest, Tricky Realities award at Tricky Women film festival, Silver Hugo award at Chicago International Film Festival, and Silver Dove audience award at DOK Leipzig.
Jiang river (Chen Xuan, 15min, 2021)
"Jiang River" is the fourth work in the sequence of Chen Xuan's Landscape video art creation.Shot in Jinhua, Zhejiang Province,the hometown of her grandparents, where the author has not arrived before, and attempts to intervene in the practice of landscape video art creation in a sociological and anthropological way. Through the exploration of her own history, she tries to connect individual narratives with social processes and specific geography, accomplishing her own breakthrough in the creation of landscape video artwork in a warm way with her own care.
Chen Xuan
CHEN XUAN was born in 1996 in Nanjing,Jiangsu,China. She got her Master’s degree in Space Image Research from the Institute, the School of Intermedia Art, China Academy of Art, 2022 and her Bachelor’s degree in Experimental Art department from the School of Intermedia Art, China Academy of Art,2019. Now, she is working &living in Hangzhou, China. She has won a series of honours for her work, such as
The 6th Documentary Exhibition of Fine Arts: Returning To Void And Dimension, Hubei Museum of Art, Wuhan in 2023;
Every Art A Dream Of Tomorrow, online exhibition.
2022 Vital Force·the 4th Zhijiang International Youth Art Festival, Zhejiang Art Museum, Hangzhou in 2022. Etc.
Growing (Liang Jingyuan, 32min, 2021)
The film captures the critical transition period in the life of Tong, a post-2000 girl preparing for the college entrance examination. She has endured family changes and pressures that her peers could never imagine, especially when her mother, the only one she could rely on, committed suicide by taking pills before her college entrance examination because of the man in her mother's fourth marriage. Her mother's death completely crushed Tong.
Tong had intense emotional needs, but no one responded, so she fell into the dilemma of "aphasia". Tong chose to write her imagined world, life experience and imagination into a novel.
Jingyuan Liang
Jingyuan Liang is a graduate of the Film and Television Department at the Central Academy of Drama, where she specialized in film directing. Currently based in Beijing, she pursues her career as a director and screenwriter. Her visual works predominantly center around nature, urban geography, and real-life individuals, with a focus on exploring themes such as familial conflicts, adolescent depression, and the challenges faced by women during their maturation process. Many of her feature films and documentary shorts have received recognition through selection for numerous esteemed film festivals.
Sliver Cave (Cai Caibei, 14min, 2022)
Stepping into a cave, the sight fluctuates by the firelight. Left to right, top to bottom. The same goes for the screen in front of you. It is a borderless tunnel, presenting domestication and desire.
Cai Caibei
Caibei Cai (b.1992 Shenzhen, China) received her MA from Jiangnan University in 2017 and Royal College of Art in 2018. She obsesses with the illusion on the screen and believes the image has a body. She is good at capturing these hidden bodies by drawing frame by frame. Her films always invite the audience to experience the conflicts within the body and the anxious environment outside the body.
Taste of Cherry (Zou Xinran, 32 min, 2022)
A woman who is haunted by nightmares due to abortion meets a cam-girl by accident. They agree to go into the mountains together. During this journey, they find each other and get a touch of solace in life.
Zou Xinran
Zou Xinran graduated from the directing department of Beijing Film Academy, has made several short films during her school years, including "men&women" and "If mama was here", and been selected for Shanghai International Short Film Week.