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“After Us, the Deluge”, 2016-2017, 59 min, language: Chinese with English subtitle

About the film:

In order to counteract the problems generated by Beijing’s unrelenting urbanization, the central government devised a series of aggressive policies seeking to forcefully disperse clusters of migrant workers in the city. When these measures proved ineffective, the Beijing Bureau of Education opted for a less confrontational approach in 2014 that administratively prevented the children of migrant workers from enrolling in local public schools. Many of the workers were brought to submission when the future of their children was held hostage. Against the backdrop of this rampant violation, an even greater injustice is the systematic and persistent exploitation of rural economies by the megacities. As much as the workers are excluded from the city, their only chance of survival is to dwell obstinately within it. What emerges can only be described as an interplay between haunting and exorcism. The workers are tossed to and from as they try everything in their power to maintain their beleaguered families, curbing the direct blows of power by simply making ends meet on a daily basis. The temporal nature of both the oppressor and the oppressed intimates the advent of a coming struggle of which we know nothing, yet.

About the filmmaker:

Song Yi, curator, writer and film maker.He was a founder of the Migrant Workers Video Collective, co-director of art space “Institute For Provocation”, founder of “Bloom绽” curating collective for contemporary and urban planning. He was senior editor of LEAP magazine, former Head of Exhibition at Long March Space, coordinated “Ho Chi Minh trail” project.