Injustice to Dou E

It's time to choose a story! Because I want to do oriental style work I think I should choose Chinese story. Injustice to Dou E is the first story comes to my mind. It is a famous Chinese opera. Here is the brief story.

Guan Hanqing was a famous Zaju (the Yuan Drama) playwright of the Yuan Dynasty, and one of the representative figures of ancient Chinese opera play writers as well. His best known work is Injustice to Dou E, which is one of "the four great tragedies of the Yuan Drama", the other three being Autumn in the Han Palace by Ma Zhiyuan, The Firmiana Rain by Bai Pu and The Orphan of Zhao by Ji Junxiang.

The period Guan Hanqing lived in was a time characterized by political corruption, social turbulences, and sharp class and national contradictions (mainly those between Meng and Han ethnic groups). People were living in great misery. Guan Hanqing's plays vividly reenact social reality and have a strong tinge of that period.

Injustice to Dou E exposes the dark side of the society of the Yuan Dynasty through the tragic death of a girl named Dou E. The heroine loses her mother at the age of 7 and is separated from her father at 10, when she was sold as a child bride to offset the debt. Not long after she grows up and gets married, her husband dies. Later she is subjected to the bullying and humiliation of hooligans and gangsters. As a result, she is wrongly accused of involvement in a murder case. Under the torture of the corrupt interrogating officials, she confesses to the false charge and is sentenced to death.

Being wronged, Dou E strongly condemns the corrupt officials, the heaven and the earth at the execution ground, vowing to retaliate against the injustice of real life. She makes three pledges before being executed - snowfalls in June, all her blood splitting on the 3-feet white silk sheet, and 3 years' drought in the local area. All three pledges are realized in due time. After her death, Dou E turns into a ghost and continues fighting for justice. Finally, her wrong is righted. The hooligans and corrupt officials have got what they deserve. Justice prevails.

Through the depiction of Dou E, a kindhearted and unyielding girl resisting the feudal forces, the play expresses the author's heart-felt compassion for the oppressed people and strong denouncement against the dark side of society. It is an immortal treasure shining through the history of Chinese literature.

What I would like to do

I kept thinking what I like and what I want to do since this term started. And I listed a list was about what I like. I like experimental or oriental style production design for film or theater design. So I want to do some thing like that. On the other hand, I hope my audience can feel they are part of the show (my work). And then oriental style site-specific show came to my mind.

Actually, at first I didn't know what is site-specific. In the first tutorial, I told to my supervisor what I liked and she recommended me that I can do some research about site-specific. She told me "punch drunk" was a nice team. So I searched some information about them. And I found out they are famous! now they are in New York. One of my friend who study in New York she went to the show named "sleep no more" and she told me it was awesome!!! 

The show is played in a hotel. Audience have to wear the masks which means they are invisible. The most special thing in this show is audience can walk around everywhere in the building. And my friend told me that you don't have to worry about you will miss the show somewhere. Because the sound effects is nice. It will lead you to the current place.   

I hope I can see this show one day! I love to be a invisible people!! Anyway spite-specific is really interesting. It is not like traditional theater design. So I decide to do this kind of design! but I want to mix "oriental style". I believe it will be cool! 

   

V&A --- Style & Subversion 1970-1990

Last weekend I went to London and I went to an exhibition in Victoria and Albert museum which named "Style & Subversion 1970-1990". Actually, for me who is a foreigner, I could not understand all of art works in the exhibition. Especially, the exhibition was talking about "postmodern" in 1970-1990. I am too young so I did not know what some work meant. (Or maybe just because my English is so poor. haha...) Anyway, generally speaking, I felt this exhibition was so so to me. Because I felt many works were a little bit old fashion... but they were old in fact... Whatever, I still admired for they could do that kind of cool things in that time. I mean nowadays almost every one can accept modern things but I don't thing in the past people could accept that. So it must be really cool when the artists created the works.

This is a short clip about this exhibition.

And below are the works which interested me.

Hologram of Boy George

Actually, I felt this picture was creepy... But it's cool because it was "3D". I searched it on the Internet and I found out this kind of work called "holo-portrait" I sill not really understand how to make it... 

Louis XIV by Jeff Koons

I like the material of this sculpture. It was so shiny. I also like his other works "balloon dog" those giant shiny and bright color sculptures. 

Consumer's rest chair by Frank Schreiner

I love this design because it just changed a little bit and then became another different thing! It is a great concept! Sometimes modifying can give old stuff new life.

Tea & Coffee Piazza by Michael Graves

How cute it is!!! It looks like part of Disneyland!!! A little castle. 

Miss balanche by Shiro Kuramata 

Beautiful material!!!  I love Shiro's crystal works. They are so elegant!

I like go to museum although sometimes the exhibition is not relative to my research. But I believe those cool design will give me inspiration one day!   

Some secrets you may not know about Disneyland

Yesterday I wrote about Japanese program and it reminds me of a report I have read before.  The report was talking about some Disneyland's secret service.  These such service make people feel they are really in a fantasy world. I hope I also can design a space that makes people forget the reality.


1.  We rarely see clocks in Disneyland.   
"Forget time" is very important in Disneyland.

2. We cannot see any mordan building (which is in the real world) from Disneyland.

"Forget the cruel of reality" is also important.

3. No mirror in the toilet. 

If people see the reflection in the mirror, those may remind them of reality.  

4. If you ask cleaners "what are you doing?", they will answer you "I am picking up dreams!"

5. If you say "tik tok" to Hook, he will run away.

 

Run for Money

Recently, I enjoy watching a Japanese TV program which name is "run for money".  This program is about play a game, approximately 15 people hiding in a aera and there are few hunters will try to find them.  If people are caught by the hunter then they are out. The people who can survive over one hour then they can win the money. The most interesting thing is participants not only need to escape and hide from hunters but also complete some missions. Whatever, the area actually is a big stage and a lot of actors and actresses play a big show, so the missions usually are part of the show. Oh my god! that is really hard to explain....

Let's see the program and some pictures!

This is the link of this program: http://www.tudou.com/programs/view/DLbILJ_rqCk/

the actor 

the participant and the hunter 

when the participant completed the mission.

the actor interacted with participant. 

This program make me think about "Maybe I can make a show that audience can participate".  

I believe that the space design will be fascinating! I have to consider about how to decorate the space that can let audience feel they really go to the different space-time.  It's cool isn't it?

    

Memories of Matsuko (Nakashima Tetsuya)

There are many musical films, but "Memories of Matsuko" is my favorite one. What makes it special is although this is a tragedy, director chose bright color tone inversely. I think it's because director wanted to change the stereotype of tragedy. 
Sad story also can have beautiful and bright color.  


That's talk about production design for this film. This is a musical film so we can see many theater and music video style in it. I really interest in these kind of mix style. When you see this film sometime you may feel that "am I seeing a musical in the theater now?" It is cool isn't? 

When I saw this poster I thought this's a happy story. But I could't stop crying after I saw it.   

 
                               

 

In the whole film, designer used bright color tone on the sets. It is ironic when you see Matsuko happily sing in the bright color set and then you will feel really sad about that. 

NINAGAWA MIKA

I have a habit which is surfing on the Internet every for looking for cool art and design work. I forgot many artists because their work not really interested me but MIKA her photographs were astonished me when I saw her work first time. Then I could not forget her name any more.

MIKA loves colorful flowers and gold fish so we can see a lot of them in her photos.
She tends to use bright colored projects to create her work, also her film as well.  

          

Below is her information from her office website.

Born in 1972, Mika Ninagawa is Japan's most popular photographer. Her photographic style is one that is instantly identified by her versatile style and the drawing from various fields. Her work is highly acclaimed across the generations from teen fashion magazines to high-end commercial fashion and advertising.

She is promoted by Tomio Koyama Gallery (www.tomiokoyamagallery.com), which introduced both Takashi Murakami and Yoshitomo Nara to the world. Her works are constantly exhibited and much loved by art collectors. Her film directorial debut, "SAKURAN"(http://www.sakuran-themovie.com) has been officially entered into the Berlinale Special section of the 57th Berlin International Film Festival. To coincide with the festival, she also held a photography exhibition at Arndt & Partner, which was extremely successful.

Her enthusiasm has gathered the attention of publishing houses, resulting in publication of one or two best selling photographic books every year for the past seven years. She relishes art direction and conceptual shoots and her well-thought out concepts come to life in vivid visuals and seemingly incongruous forms. She does not only specialize in portrait photography, but also in still life photography of flowers, goldfish and landscapes. Her influence resonates with the many followers who copy her styles and mimic her stance.


(from http://www.ninamika.com/en/about/index.html)






Above I mentioned that she is also a director. In her film "Sakuran" there are many colorful flowers and fish as well. 

a short clip from Sakuran

I admire her for she can insist what she likes such as flowers and strong color. It makes that even without signature we still can tell that is her work. Now I always change my style of work, I hope I can find my own in the future.