China Daily Global Edition (USA)
Wave of nostalgia
Architect uses closed factory to help rekindle fond memories
Buildings, like people, can sometimes hold a special place in our hearts. They are after all, places where memories are made. Even when they fall into a state of disrepair with broken windows, peeling paint and rotten floorboards, they can still ignite warm feelings.
Architect Li Hao had such a feeling for an old factory building that had seen, to put it kindly, better days.
Three years ago, he renovated a theater in a former ceramic factory founded in 1958 in Kunlun town, East China’s Shandong province.
The theater, built in 1977, was where the factory held shows and meetings and screened movies. It had fallen into ruin. Sunshine streamed like spotlights through the high glassless windows on the wall.
Li, 34, went to work with his imagination. He went for an arc-shaped interior with mirrors. This gave the impression of a crowd even if only a few people were actually in attendance. It added to the atmosphere.
He then invited former factory employees to visit. When more than 200 surged in, the dam seemed to open as memories and images of the past flooded back in a wave of nostalgia.
Li had even found slides in the rubble that he projected onto the walls.
Since June 6 Li’s project has been on exhibition at Beijing’s Inside-Out Art Museum. One of the curators, Qian Mengni, says Li’s apparent and obvious sincerity is the most moving aspect of the work.
The exhibition titled An Impulse to Turn focuses on how young artists have dealt with historical material and context.
Li has made the temporary “theater” and the real theater that was set to be dismantled into a double-memory scene, Qian says. The curator is referring to the old memory of factory life and the recent memory of the farewell installation.
A group of Li’s relatives and friends, including his parents, grandfather, uncle and aunt, all actually worked at the factory. Li was born in the mid-1980s. That was a time when a large State-owned factory like this could employ thousands of people and was equipped with every facility its employees and their families needed: hospital, canteen, school, hotel and even funeral parlor.
People there knew each other well. When Li was sent by his grandma to buy steamed buns from the canteen at the age of 5, the majority of the time he spent on his way and back was to chitchat with family friends.
In Li’s memory, the factory shows were as glamorous as the New Year Galas on TV. His mother used to be the host, and he used to perform as a lead actor with his peers together on the stage.
He had good times; he had bad times, and an embarrassing time. One day during a big family celebration to mark his grandmother’s 60th birthday, a classmate ran in to announce the news that Li’s homework had just been ranked the worst in class. He was teased about it for days on end.
The factory closed down in the late 1990s, as part of the nationwide reforms on State-owned enterprises. This was followed by his parents’ divorce.
During the first days of 2017, Li took his wife to show her where he was raised, and learned that the building was soon due to be pulled down.
“It’s like an old item or an aged person that’s always guarding you. You assumed it would always be there, only to find it’s dying,” Li says. He felt like having to do something instead of just letting it go.
“When my grandma passed away, we held a solemn farewell ceremony at the funeral parlor just across from the theater. So I thought I could create something really artistic and architectural to bid farewell the venue.”
Li then talked to his parents separately. The divorced couple had not seen each other for a decade, but both supported the project. His father, a graphic designer, offered to get involved in the installation work.
“There had been tension between me and my father. Probably he wanted to find a way out for us, so he suggested that we could just do something together, instead of talking about our emotions,” Li says, adding that their relations improved after the project.
So the father and the son started the project. They soon found out, to their surprise, that an old acquaintance was still there. Clad in a security guard’s uniform, the mentallychallenged middle-aged man, who when Li was a boy was known for saluting everyone he met as if he was a soldier, greeted them both with smart salute, just like the old days. They were delighted when he became part of the project, diligently guarding their materials during the night.
When the installation was completed, Li’s parents uploaded a poster on their WeChat moments, inviting former colleagues to join the theater’s 40th anniversary and its “last curtain call”.
The former workers came in groups, watching slide shows, taking photos and dining together. Some were unable to hold their emotions in check.
Some also brought their children thereby ensuring that memories would be passed on.
Up until this project, Li had been unsure what direction his architecture should take.
In his 9-year career after graduating from the Central Academy of Fine Arts in Beijing, he has often been conflicted by various kinds of social relations with his clients, which to some extent would affect his designs.
But for him, the installation was like a firework the moment it explodes, releasing a huge burst of energy and engraving a memory in the minds of a whole group of people.
“If I am to be an architect for the rest of my life, I’d like to try my best to influence the small group of people that would profoundly relate to my works, just as I achieved with this installation,” he says.
The demolition was canceled two days after the farewell, probably due to lack of funds, Li says, adding that he will go there again to record its last day.