MCLC: Liu Jian US tour

[Denton, Kirk]

MCLC LIST
From: Xin Zhou <xin.zhou66 at gmail.com>
Subject: Liu Jian US tour
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The Animation of the Real: Liu Jian Northeast US Tour

A series of events to showcase the work of seminal Chinese independent
animation filmmaker Liu Jian is taking place during February 2014, with
visits to Harvard University, Colgate University, College of Staten
Island, and Spectacle Theater.

Animation is often conceived of as a surrealist and fantastical mode of
filmmaking. In Piercing I (Citong wo, 2010), Liu Jian presents us with an
alternative style. Liu’s film is a raw, social realism through animation
that confronts the accelerating speed of Chinese society, and represents
the lives of migrating souls as they navigate China’s radical social and
economic transformations. Piercing I is a strikingly real and contemporary
take on the urban landscapes of this fast-developing nation. The film
looks into the struggles of rural migrants as they inhabit new urban
realms, and touches upon issues of mobility, corruption and social
inequalities. The current social and political stances of the
establishment in China cannot tolerate a film with these topics, and
indeed Piercing I was not granted official approval for commercial release.

Piercing I marks the first Chinese independent animated feature. The film
was animated digitally and takes place in the city of Nanjing, where Liu
lives and works. Continuing in this autobiographical vein, Liu’s
protagonist, Zhang Xiaojun, represents a rural-to-urban transplant who
struggles to adjust to city life. Zhang must confront urban culture, and
its juxtapositions high and low, rich and poor.

Liu Jian is currently visiting New York as a grantee of the Asian Cultural
Council.

Piercing I
(Ci Tong Wo 刺痛我)
Dir. LIU Jian, 2010
Music: Zuoxiao Zuzhou
China, 75 min
Chinese with English Subtitles

Schedule:
Tuesday, February 11, 2:30-4:30PM
Center for the Arts-Screening Room (Building 1P- Room 223)
College of Staten Island (CSI)
Wednesday, February 12th, 8PM
Spectacle Theater, 124 South 3rd St, Brooklyn, NY
http://www.spectacletheater.com/piercing-i-%E5%88%BA%E7%97%9B%E6%88%91-with
-liu-jian/

Friday, Feb 14th, 6PM
CGIS South, 1730 Cambridge Street,
Tsai Auditorium (S010), Harvard University
http://fairbank.fas.harvard.edu/event/piercing-i

Monday, Feb 17th, 7PM
Little 114
Colgate University

Filmmaker Bio
Liu Jian studied Chinese landscape painting and graduated from the Nanjing
University of the Arts in 1993. Over the past two decades, his work has
drawn on a range of media and aesthetic approaches and has been presented
at major exhibitions both in China and abroad. In 1995, he began making
works of animation and in 2007 he independently established the Le-joy
Animation Studio. His first feature-length animation work, PIERCING I
(Citong wo, 2010), has received numerous prestigious awards at film
festivals across Asia and Europe.