Compulsory Stopping, Performance, Shanghai, 2016
Xianqiao is a village located on the suburb of Shanghai and is a model area of the government's "new modernist countryside”. It is visually divided into the residential area and the farming area by a super wide road. The road was so wide it didn't even look like a normal village road.
I carried a bundle of rope and hiked from one end of this road to the other. As I moved forward, I invited people I encountered to stop and join me for a rope swing game across the road for a few minutes, and then together we moved across the road for a while until we met the next person. Along the way, there were people speeding along in electric cars and villagers walking along the roadside to cool off after dinner. Some were so excited to participate that they couldn't stop playing; some slowed down while driving and spoke to me curiously, telling me to be safe; some saw the rope in the middle of the road and instead whistled faster, like they were trying to crash through an obstacle in the way. In that case, I quickly dropped the rope and jumped out of the way.
Along the way I invited the person I encountered to stop and shake the rope with me until the next one passing by. It is the main road of the village, but there were few pedestrians. The occasional passer-by rushes by in a variety of modern vehicles such as cars, electric tricycles and motorcycles. I noticed those who passed this awkward village road alone in motor vehicles shows different state from the rest of the villagers. They sat stiffly, with eyes transfixed, as if wrapped up in a mysterious mission to move forward, like sleepwalking sheep.
The road as a non-place was forced to become a place through the performance. When to stop and who is the next to stop? I was holding the negotiations all alone.
Camera: Lili Xie.
