Lost in Home

Artist/Director: Tan Tan

Category: Experimental film／Video installation/Intermedia art

Length: 29:35min

Production year: 2013

  • 5th XI'AN International video festival, "The best exploration"Award, Xi’an, China, October，2014
  • Chinese Women Artists Video Art Festival, Mexico City, Mexico, June，2015
  • 1st Changjiang International photography & Video Biennale, Chongqing, China, April，2015
  • 11th IAWRT Asian Women's Film Festival, New Delhi, India, March，2015
  •  "EXIM 2014"-Experimental Video Festival in Macao, China, November，2014
  •  DANS QUELLE VIE TU MONDE(S)?-“The China-French Cultural Spring”，Wuhan,China,June，2014
  • Academy+Space "Social Dimension"-Young Artists Invitational Exhibition, Hubei Museum of Art, Wuhan, China, April，2014
  • 1st ASEAN Biennial, Nanning, China, December，2013
  • 3rd Beijing film Academy International New Media Arts Triennial Exhibition, Beijing, China, October，2013
  • China Central Academy Of Fine Arts Agnès Varda's Award,Beijing, China, October，2013
  • "Lost In Home"Tan Tan Experimental Film/Video Art, CCD Workstation, Beijing, China, August，2013
  • The 10th Beijing Independent Film Festival, Beijing, China, August，2013
  • "Lost in Home"Tan Tan Moving Image Exhibition+Improvised Music Concert, Jiali Gallery, Beijing, China, July，2013
  • 43th Tampere Film Festival-"Retrospective of Tan Tan", Finland, March，2013
  • "FestArt"exhibition of 43th Tampere Film Festival, Finland, February，2013

The work has been shown often in the form of one-channel Experimental film, but it can be regarded as an intermedia art work as well. Because there are vital elements of photography, live performance during the shooting of the work, and after it was produced, it has been exhibited in diverse ways such as video installation, image with live music.

“Xian An Fang” is an old community built from 1910 to the 30s. It had ever been the best-preserved stone-ringed door community in China, and one of the most western-culture-influenced neighborhood. From 2012, it has been demolished and rebuilt, so the memories of 100 years will disappear under the new cover. The work uses “Xian An Fang” as a background, and attempts to break the boundaries between documentary, fiction and performance, by the means of creating a subjective time-space which is parallel to the reality of China.

The first part"Past" is a 1-channel video that mixes the current photos of many details of the community with the historical photos. The audience will have a glimpse of European concession memories in the 20s-30s.

The second part"Present" is a video installation with 2 channels opposite to each other, in one channel is a pregnant woman walking, in the other is an old woman walking, they both are in some demolished street, sometimes they suddenly meet each other. The audience will only realize that the two women are walking in the same place at the end, meanwhile they will understand that the pregnant woman is going out of the community, but the old woman is entering the community.

The third part "Future" is a 1-channel video, which is a documentary of a real party arranged by me in the community. In the party, Some young people acted a fake TV show talking about how to build this area into luxury look, and they also made a music concert at night. They talked a lot about western fashion and stars, sang English rock songs. They shouted the lyrics "What the hell I'm doing here,I don't belong here", "I forget how did I come here from my home...Who took me here..."At last, they were all drunk in the dark ruins...

The exhibitions of "Lost in Home" in different forms, as a video installation, as a film, or as a live performance: