WEBVTT 00:00:11.760 --> 00:00:16.278 Dear ladies and gentlemen, I’m China Tracy,  the avatar of Cao Fei, 00:00:16.764 --> 00:00:18.548 and I’m her interpreter. 00:00:24.499 --> 00:00:30.380 Our generation has grown up in a fluid and  mobile environment where cultures mix and diverge. 00:00:34.747 --> 00:00:38.553 Pop culture has spread rapidly into  every corner of China. 00:00:38.553 --> 00:00:42.250 When I was little, I would go out and learn street dance. 00:00:45.607 --> 00:00:48.760 Later, I fell in love with hip-hop music. 00:00:51.608 --> 00:00:59.682 I see the world with a sense of humor; street culture is  a very natural, wild, free, and spontaneous form of expression. 00:01:01.442 --> 00:01:07.245 It’s like the notion of sampling  in hip-hop, which is to mix all different kinds of things together. 00:01:08.102 --> 00:01:15.764 In music videos, visuality,  montage, music, and imagery are blended into a single process. 00:01:18.033 --> 00:01:22.427 Perhaps music takes the place of  some of the narrative and feeling. 00:01:23.145 --> 00:01:26.944 Music itself becomes a very emotional part of the work. 00:01:27.801 --> 00:01:33.931 If I had grown up just focusing on the written word or photography or still images, 00:01:33.931 --> 00:01:37.405 my way of  thinking would have been totally different. 00:01:46.065 --> 00:01:51.312 I had just graduated from college and had  opportunity to become exposed to the working world. 00:01:51.312 --> 00:01:54.892 I got a taste of reality in a pretty  close and intimate way, 00:01:54.892 --> 00:01:58.973 and I felt that I could critique reality through my artwork. 00:02:00.108 --> 00:02:05.427 Looking back years later, the critique seems a bit severe, even blunt. 00:02:05.844 --> 00:02:11.627 But my later works began to reflect  on a more thorough understanding of society as a whole, 00:02:11.627 --> 00:02:16.585 and they are quite different from  the impulsive urges of that early period. 00:02:18.275 --> 00:02:23.078 [ strumming music ] 00:02:33.360 --> 00:02:38.153 After I did the first "Hip-Hop Project," I  started working on cosplayers. 00:02:38.755 --> 00:02:44.160 We translate cosplay into Chinese as role-playing.  It grows from a generation under the 00:02:44.160 --> 00:02:46.972 influence of the cartoon culture. 00:02:49.149 --> 00:02:51.856 Neither cosplaying nor hip-hop is native to China, 00:02:51.856 --> 00:02:57.005 but when we experience it, we feel somehow that  it has become very indigenous and original. 00:03:00.320 --> 00:03:04.398 I was working part-time as an art director for  advertising companies. 00:03:05.000 --> 00:03:09.561 When scouting locations, we would come across ruined scenes and images. 00:03:09.561 --> 00:03:12.884 Those places have left a deep impression on me. 00:03:13.301 --> 00:03:19.452 These settings and backgrounds are very important to the characters and how they relate to each other. 00:03:23.634 --> 00:03:28.382 Even in real life, the cosplayers place themselves into cartoon characters roles 00:03:28.382 --> 00:03:32.480 so much that they carry their cartoon roles into their everyday lives. 00:03:34.008 --> 00:03:41.624 It is a new kind of role reversal which also reflects the younger generation's discontent with their roles in real life. 00:03:43.569 --> 00:03:47.274 Cosplay reflects the gap between these two generations. 00:03:47.274 --> 00:03:51.717 Neither is willing to strike a  compromise or reach an accord with the other. 00:03:57.023 --> 00:04:03.198 When I got an invitation from Siemens  electric, I started to work on the video "Whose Utopia?" 00:04:03.198 --> 00:04:07.803 I thought that this might be a  good opportunity to shoot inside a factory, 00:04:07.803 --> 00:04:13.694 usually very difficult because generally there is  a high level of commercial protectionism. 00:04:14.898 --> 00:04:18.943 It’s not an expose nor is it about political correctness. 00:04:18.943 --> 00:04:23.742 It attempts to examine this particular kind of reality from multiple angles, 00:04:23.742 --> 00:04:28.471 how workers are on the lookout for the chance and opportunity to survive. 00:04:41.785 --> 00:04:47.659 It also has this avatar-like element  with the workers role-playing their fantasies. 00:04:48.145 --> 00:04:54.305 I often have the feeling that they truly value  this kind of opportunity to remake themselves. 00:04:57.407 --> 00:05:05.932 For corporations to let artists create works with the factory as the backdrop is an attempt to forge a corporate culture. 00:05:08.109 --> 00:05:13.995 What artists do in reality in the art world is not all that important to the corporation. 00:05:13.995 --> 00:05:17.625 What’s important is the project that is created. 00:06:04.920 --> 00:06:09.467 My composer Zhang Anding introduced me to Second  Life in 2006. 00:06:09.467 --> 00:06:15.925 He was purchasing land in an online game, and he said that he can construct and have his own second life. 00:06:18.055 --> 00:06:22.571 Subsequently, I opened this account, my account for China Tracy. 00:06:23.520 --> 00:06:27.724 I was absolutely enthralled and spellbound by it from the beginning. 00:06:28.210 --> 00:06:33.172 I started with the very basics, how to take my first baby steps, and how to talk to people. 00:06:33.172 --> 00:06:36.720 The whole process  was totally captivating and riveting. 00:06:37.000 --> 00:06:40.000 China is her surname, Tracy the given name. 00:06:40.255 --> 00:06:46.633 I wanted to enter this virtual world with an ordinary person's perspective to see what was happening out there. 00:06:47.698 --> 00:06:51.468 In the beginning, I was working with a set of predesigned personas 00:06:51.468 --> 00:06:55.891 that a new second life user can choose from when constructing their avatar. 00:06:55.891 --> 00:07:03.985 Over time, I spent a lot of money buying her skin, her eyes, her figure, and even her sex organs to give her a more modern look. 00:07:10.267 --> 00:07:15.129 "iMirror," my documentary made in second life,  has a feminine perspective. 00:07:15.129 --> 00:07:22.911 In this documentary, you will see a strong sense of selfhood, a sense of using my own body, my own self to explore this world. 00:07:30.159 --> 00:07:35.538 The encounter between me and Hug Yue occurred when I was exploring around in my online journey. 00:07:35.700 --> 00:07:38.424 I saw a very handsome guy  playing a piano. 00:07:39.698 --> 00:07:43.519 I was drawn by the piano music, which was very romantic. 00:07:44.700 --> 00:07:50.746 Quietly and secretively, I stood at a distance, shooting the scene of him playing the piano. 00:07:51.371 --> 00:07:54.412 After a while, he asked China Tracy for a dance. 00:07:54.412 --> 00:07:59.204 We began to get to know each other, and I found him a gentleman with a fine sense of humor. 00:08:00.920 --> 00:08:06.303 There are many romantic stories like this  one in second life between one male and one female avatar. 00:08:06.303 --> 00:08:12.002 But perhaps behind the scenes, there may be two females, but in real life they are two guys. 00:08:12.488 --> 00:08:16.520 Nonetheless, romance still transpires between these avatars 00:08:16.520 --> 00:08:22.210 like the case with me and Hug Yue, even though  it did not ultimately lead to a full-blown romance. 00:08:24.572 --> 00:08:29.423 I finally learned that he was about 67,  a fairly old guy in real life. 00:08:29.423 --> 00:08:35.318 He is a communist, a big fan of Marx, and he would often wear  a t-shirt with Marx’s image. 00:08:36.684 --> 00:08:41.920 So I got to see both his romantic and idealistic sides.  I also got the impression of him being 00:08:41.920 --> 00:08:48.472 very political and zealous, having a kind  of-- in Mao’s words-- romantic heroism. 00:08:51.320 --> 00:08:54.461 Through "iMirror," you can peek into the digital world. 00:08:54.461 --> 00:08:57.517 Everything is much more intense than the real world. 00:08:58.119 --> 00:09:03.297 It’s much more unbridled and wild.  That’s why so many people get hooked on Second Life. 00:09:03.644 --> 00:09:09.884 In it, they try to find a kind of life  with emotions that they want for themselves in real life. 00:09:12.477 --> 00:09:17.399 But in the end, you will find that in  this documentary, that is something beyond reach. 00:09:27.124 --> 00:09:31.353 "RMB City" was conceived while I was still exploring Second Life. 00:09:35.901 --> 00:09:40.638 I was wondering if I could have my own community and my own city built purely by myself. 00:09:40.638 --> 00:09:43.899 So I started to envision what this city might look like. 00:09:55.361 --> 00:09:59.785 In 2007, the video of RMB City  was basically finished. 00:09:59.785 --> 00:10:04.328 It’s an imagining, a draft design of the overall appearance of this city. 00:10:11.136 --> 00:10:19.843 It represents the building and development of an urban center with all that entails: investment, expansion, overdevelopment. 00:10:20.862 --> 00:10:25.717 What’s important is to make an imaginary city run smoothly like a real one. 00:10:34.334 --> 00:10:40.000 We first came up with a list of options for all the different components in the building of  the city, 00:10:40.000 --> 00:10:44.232 different buildings and landmarks that we absolutely want to have in the cityscape. 00:10:56.721 --> 00:11:02.701 We designed an urban plan by combining these different components utilizing collages. 00:11:03.210 --> 00:11:10.551 Our next step was to feed the design into three-dimensional software to build it up into an architectural model. 00:11:10.551 --> 00:11:16.369 Then we turned this software over to our virtual architects to be uploaded into Second Life. 00:11:22.505 --> 00:11:25.000 I would prefer it to be a more open environment 00:11:25.000 --> 00:11:28.960 where you can keep adding things to implement whatever ideas you come up with. 00:11:29.640 --> 00:11:34.200 We’re now at a stage where we have to  feel our way or as Deng Xiaoping said, 00:11:34.200 --> 00:11:37.325 "Cross the river by touching the stones." 00:11:43.507 --> 00:11:46.463 Take our current mayoral program for example. 00:11:46.463 --> 00:11:49.607 Each mayor will serve a three-month term for RMB City 00:11:49.607 --> 00:11:54.806 and be free to make his own policies and decisions or to have her own interpretation of the city. 00:11:55.917 --> 00:12:01.076 I think this also releases me from any responsibility  to keep control of the city. 00:12:02.234 --> 00:12:06.241 There will be no party committee. We will have a board of  directors. 00:12:06.519 --> 00:12:13.861 We’ll have a judicial system with a judge somewhat like legendary Bao Gong, the Chinese embodiment of justice. 00:12:17.867 --> 00:12:21.566 RMB City is in many ways like the painting from the Han  Dynasty, 00:12:21.566 --> 00:12:27.292 with clouds and mist, hills and rivers, and the interrelationship between humans and nature. 00:12:27.292 --> 00:12:32.313 It made me wonder if this aesthetic is deeply rooted in the Asian way of thinking. 00:12:33.888 --> 00:12:39.874 I’ve always been looking for these connections, the differences and similarities between the past and present, 00:12:39.874 --> 00:12:41.734 the Asian and the Western. 00:12:49.491 --> 00:12:53.623 RMB is the abbreviation for the Chinese currency,  the renminbi. 00:12:53.623 --> 00:13:00.166 "Renmin" means the people, the general population, and the "r" could almost stand for republic or revolution. 00:13:00.814 --> 00:13:03.794 In Chinese, the name sounds like “the people's city.” 00:13:04.164 --> 00:13:11.242 So it comes to take on all these associative meanings. I think it sounds  like "remember city," a city of memories. 00:13:14.160 --> 00:13:18.590 I don't think that building my own city is an expression of individualism. 00:13:18.590 --> 00:13:24.350 I feel it is precisely an acknowledgment of the belief in and the practice of democracy. 00:13:24.734 --> 00:13:31.220 I think this project will lead to the foundation on  which to experiment with utopian practices. 00:13:54.493 --> 00:13:58.414 [ ANNOUNCER ] To learn more about Art21: “Art in the Twenty-First Century" 00:13:58.414 --> 00:14:00.530 and its educational resources, 00:14:00.530 --> 00:14:03.924 please visit us online at: PBS.org 00:14:07.536 --> 00:14:13.171 Art21: “Art in the Twenty-First Century” is available on Blu-Ray and DVD. 00:14:13.171 --> 00:14:15.495 The companion book is also available. 00:14:15.495 --> 00:14:18.653 To order, visit us online at: shopPBS.org 00:14:18.653 --> 00:14:23.154 or call PBS Home Video at: 1-800-PLAY-PBS