onNodeFocus
A human is an essential container for holding stories. Humans record stories and leave traces behind. Generations obtain information from everything around them, records, ruins, rumours, etc... My research was first inspired by three letters written in 1990 and 1991 from my dad to mum, and conducted through interviews and remote local research about my birth city. The project begins the exploration around six sites and events of a Chinese coastal city. From the perspective of either an inhabitant or a bystander, the narrative lets audiences peek into the facts, emergencies, rumors, creation, and reconstruction that happened in the city, reflecting on the resources and information transfer in places. Use monochromatic drawing and frame-by-frame animation to make sequential statements and imaginations of each location, and to a large extent eliminate my emotion that could be brought by colour, give the audience and residents a wider understanding and trigger the reflection on the development of the city.
Jiazhen Cai was born in Dalian, a coastal city in the northeast of China. After the first nineteen years of growing in the city, she made herself to the broader world. Jiazhen now is a London and China based illustrator and visual artist with a background in ceramics from Central Academy of Fine Arts, Beijing.Using a comprehensive range of visual mediums, with particular attention to narrative and atmosphere making, she is also a moving image maker. Her works are mainly inspired by daily illusions and the gaps in society and institutions.Jiazhen’s drawings have received awards from Adobe, Creative Quarterly, and Hiii Illustration.
