Intermedia/Interarts Workshop 3. The Intermedial Body: Chinese Arts and Beyond

Intermedia/Interarts Workshop 3

The Intermedial Body: Chinese Arts and Beyond

at Birkbeck Instittue for the Moving Image
43 Gordon Square, London, WC1H 0PD

General Coordination: Lúcia Nagib
Convenors: Mark Player, Hsin Hsieh
Organised by the University of Reading in collaboration with BIMI (Birkbeck Institute for the Moving Image)
Sponsored by the British Council under the aegis of the UK-China Humanities Alliance
Co-sponsored by Hangzhou Normal University
Screening of Silhouette/Shadow kindly supported by iPreciation

The workshop ‘The Intermedial Body: Chinese Arts and Beyond’ is a development of the cross-institutional project ‘(Re)connecting Research in China’, involving the University of Reading (the organiser of this event), the University of Exeter (the PI on the project), King’s College and the University of Manchester, and is funded by the British Council, within the remit of the UK-China Humanities Alliance.

The workshop focuses on the corporeal aspects of intermediality in Chinese arts and beyond, and considers how combining different media and their traces affects the human body. The body is a unique site for investigations of the intermedial because of its dual role of being the producer and subject of art. This event brings together researchers and artists to consider the presence of an ‘intermedial body’ and its ability to personify the different ways and reasons artists combine media in their pursuit of creative and transcultural expression.

The workshop will open, on 10th May, with an evening homage to Chinese Nobel prize winning author Gao Xingjian and a rare screening of his first film Silhouette/Shadow (2007), introduced by his celebrated translator, Mabel Lee. Gao’s transmedial profile cuts across literature, theatre, painting, photography and film. The workshop will proceed on 11th May with a full day of talks and videos.

This workshop is FREE to attend. Please select which day(s) you wish to attened when booking.

DAY 1 - Free Screening of Silhouette/Shadow followed by post-screening wine reception

DAY 2 - 'The Intermedial Body' workshop

See more information about each day's activities below.

DAY 1 (FRIDAY 10 MAY)

SCREENING AND WINE RECEPTION

18:00-18:30

Video Introduction

Autobiographical Dimensions of Gao Xingjian’s Film Silhouette/Shadow

Mabel Lee (University of Sydney/Hong Kong Metropolitan University)

18:30-20:00

Screening: Silhouette/Shadow (2007)

dir. Gao Xingjian (runtime: 85 minutes)

About the film: Described by its maker as a ‘cinepoem’, Silhouette/Shadow (2007), the first feature-length film of Nobel Prize-winning writer, dramaturg and artist Gao Xingjian, is part documentary, part dreamscape. Made in the shadow of near-death experience following hospitalisation and life-saving surgeries in 2002 and 2003, it ruminates on Gao’s mortality and his creative practice as he produces Chinese ink paintings and rehearses and stages theatre productions such as Snow in August in Taipei and, fittingly, The Man Who Questions Death in Marseille. In Gao’s ‘cinepoem’, reality is art and death is life.

20:00-21:00

Drinks reception

DAY 2 (SATURDAY 11 MAY)

THE INTERMEDIAL BODY WORKSHOP

09:00-09:45

Arrival/Registration

09:45-10:00

Workshop Welcome/Introduction

Matthew Barrington, Lúcia Nagib, Mark Player, Hsin Hsieh

10:00-11:00

Keynote Speech

My Dream: The Intermedial Turn in Contemporary Chinese Performing Arts

Haiping Yan (Tsinghua University) - presented virtually

11:00-11:15

Coffee break

11:15-13:00

Panel 1: The Artistic Body

Bodily Materiality and Consciousness in Gao Xingjian's Paintings and Films

Shuangyi Li (University of Bristol)

Transmedial Physical Aspect in Classical Chinese Poetics

Rong Ou (Hangzhou Normal University)

Embodied Performance of Classic Dubbed Foreign Films in China

Haina Jin (Communication University of China)

13:00:14:30

Lunch

14:30-16:15

Panel 2: The Cinematic Body

The Disposable Body: Dying for Art in Chinese Cinema

Lúcia Nagib (University of Reading)

Navigating The World: (Inter)Medial Spaces and the Body

Mark Player (University of Reading)

Tomorrow Cannot Be Waited: Intermedial Bodies in a Sinofuturistic World

Hsin Hsieh (University of Reading)

16:15-16:30

Tea break

16:30-17:30

Artist’s Talk

Embodying Hedda Gabler for Chinese Stage

Faye Chunfang Fei (East China Normal University)

17:30-19:15

Panel 3: The Intermedial Body Beyond Chinese Art

Re-enacting Silent Movie Prologues: Embodying Intermediality

Albert Elduque (Universitat Pompeu Fabra), John Gibbs and Lucy Tyler (University of Reading)

FREE tea and coffee refreshments will be provided during breaks throughout the day. Lunch is not included.