Frontiers

When it seems that Chinese youths have all become performers on social media, I start to wonder what it is self-expression all about today, particularly in the field of the subculture, where I have been deeply rooted. So I made this film. It's a multi-sensory feast of music, drag, art and dance, performed by China’s most rambunctious, generation-defining artists.

When I met them, I was shocked by their bold and hilarious souls. They led me into the unknown frontiers they have found, where the audacious emotions explode and flow. Paradoxically, this is precisely their safe boundaries where they are comfortable discovering who they are.

"Give him a mask, and he will tell you the truth." But what makes me wonder is whether they have their masks on when they perform the arts, or when they return to their everyday life, or maybe both.

Original premier on Nowness, part of #Chinawave series
nowness.com/seasons/china-wave/frontiers-roni-shao

The eight performers featured in this film are as follows:

Absolute Purity is a Shanghai-based experimental post-punk band, known for their explosive sets, who merge melancholic vocals with touches of electronica and psychedelia.

Alex Wang & ChillChill join forces to create a whole new audiovisual landscape. Alex Wang is a Shanghai-based producer, musician, and DJ who creates futuristic club sounds. ChillChill is a 3D artist who uses game engines, algorithms and virtual worlds to explore people's relationships with the internet and reality.

Faded Ghost is the producer/DJ pseudonym of Shanghai-based vocalist ChaCha Yehaiyahan. She is as much at home on the stage at SXSW as in the underground clubs of Beijing. In Frontiers, she performs an ethereal vocal set cross-legged and surrounded by intergalactic flora and fauna.

Hua Who is a practitioner of Shibari, the Japanese art of rope bondage, which has found a new home in China's fetish clubs and queer spaces.

Du Yanhao is a Chinese contemporary dancer and choreographer.

Huang Jiaqi is a model and photographer known for his shy yet expressive aesthetic voice. In Frontiers, he is seen smearing himself with lipstick until his entire face and torso are covered in deep red.

Jia Wei (JahjahWay) is a Beijing rapper who belongs to Purple Soul, one of the biggest hip hop groups in China. His crew is currently setting the music industry on fire by releasing music with politically sensitive material.

Yi Hao is a makeup artist and drag performer from Chengdu. For this performance, he faces the camera in a resplendent extraterrestrial outfit and wears exaggerated fingertips. His character is then beset by a dark figure that robs him of his clothes, leaving him naked and powerless.

Production COMPULSORY

Cast: Roni Shao