Qingshuihe Field Recording

Co-Creators: Xiuyuan Shen, Qiming Luo
Type: Field recordings, Sound Collection, Improvisational Performance, Community Interaction/Intervention
Year: 2017-2018
Exhibition: Bi-City Biennale of Urbanism/Architecture

Overview

Qingshuihe Field Recording is an experimental project that combines field recording, social research, and artistic practice. The work revolves around a series of field recordings and improvisational performances conducted in 2017 by me and Qiming Luo in the Qingshuihe urban village in Shenzhen, during the period of the Shenzhen-Hong Kong The Bi-City Biennale of Urbanism/Architecture. Taking place in a venue that had been abandoned due to exhibition-related controversies, we blended everyday ambient sounds, noise music, and spontaneous community messages to explore the possibilities of artistic intervention in society. We also examined how individuals might attain a shift in subjectivity and recognition of self through “site-specific” actions under a high-pressure political climate.

Qingshuihe Village is located next to the Caopu Subway Station in Luohu District of Shenzhen city. It is surrounded by many urban villages which is not confined to the specific area. The conditions of the urban village, whether the daily life or the housing, are inconsistent with people’s impression of Shenzhen. A large number of migrant workers who live here have different accents, and rising buildings which across the Guangshen Railway overlook this place. All the recordings are made here in this album. People, animals, machines, the flowing and changing sounds leave their supports, through interweaving, ejecting, echoing, and inversing, sounds form a new plane sliding in the interior of the vibration, overflowing onto the outside of significance. Listeners require to do some active listening in order to enter this sound-scape.

Background and Motivations

Since the HK Umbrella Movement in 2014, tensions between Hong Kong artists and the government or large institutions have continued to escalate. During the 2015 Shenzhen-Hong Kong Biennale, some Hong Kong artists, who were protesting top-down urban planning initiatives, were forcibly removed from the exhibition site, resulting in deep skepticism and resentment toward such events. In 2017, I was invited with Luo—to visit Hong Kong for a series of projects combining psychoanalysis theories and contemporary art practice, aiming to exchange experiences with local artists and community organizations and to build bridges for the upcoming Biennale under the complexity of mainland China’s high-pressure policies.

During this period, my collaborator, who had firsthand experience living in an urban village, shared perspectives on life markedly different from those in Hong Kong: “You may have streetlights on all night, but where I live, it’s completely dark once you step outside. You have to grope your way down several steps to find the light switch, and it’s easy to slip or misstep.” While inspecting temporary housing near the exhibition site, we discovered four or five workers living in a cramped space less than ten square meters in size.① Inspired by this, the Hong Kong artist proposed writing the protest slogan “whitewashing peace” in cement on the venue’s glass door; as the cement was mixed, a passing worker commented, “This cement is so thin—when the wind blows, there’ll be nothing left.” That line became part of the slogan: “Whitewashing peace: When the wind blows, nothing is left. ② ” Meanwhile, my collaborator wrote protest statements on the exhibition walls.

However, during the official setup for the Shenzhen sub-venue, tensions arose when we attempted to create critical slogans using cement on the front glass of the exhibition venue—attracting the attention of the China ’s political security department. The sub-venue curator received orders from higher authorities, causing the Hong Kong artist to leave the team and the exhibition space to be shut down. This abrupt “temporary empowerment” and subsequent “temporary deprivation” forced both Luo and me to reflect on our roles and positions as artists.

Field Recording and Site-Specific Practice

Once the exhibition space was locked down, Luo and I gained temporary access to a shipping container and surrounding areas. We decided to carry out an impromptu field recording initiative in Qingshuihe urban village:

Sound Collection

We roamed alleyways and construction sites within the urban village, using recording equipment to capture local everyday sounds.

Live Performance

We utilized the abandoned exhibition venue to hold improvisational noise music performances, inviting friends and villagers to participate, held every 1-2 weeks. Walls that had been painted over gradually became a canvas for spontaneous messages and graffiti.

Community Connections

Through conversations with bystanders, workers, and residents, we found that they had no clear concept of “exhibitions” or “art.” Yet, they still experienced a subtle sense of possibility in connecting everyday life with art, simply by being on site.

This process reflects both the vulnerability and resilience of art in the face of political systems and social conflicts. As Jacques Rancière suggests, “equality” and “emancipation” often appear fleetingly in events; in such moments of “temporary empowerment,” individuals can reassess their identities and social contexts, prompting new forms of action.

Division of Labor and Contributions

I planned the project, conducted background research and field recording, including communication with local communities, on-site sound gathering, post-production, editing, mixing, as well as album design. Organized, performed in, and documented the improvisational performances at the venue.

Luo collaborated on fieldwork, community outreach, recording, and planning/performing at the venue, including proposing explicit protest content during exhibition setup. Contributed to audio editing, post-production mixing, and album design, overseeing most of the physical album production print process.

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CD record’s surface design displays the stone employed for sonic capture by scraping it along urban village walls and ground. color, photoshop, 2018

Conclusion

Although Qingshuihe Field Recording is not a highly polished artistic piece, it demonstrates the delicate power of art caught between institutional constraints and social realities: when creators engage with a community in the most direct ways, the mundane ambient sounds of daily life can become expressions of “resistance” or “voice.” This experience also offered me a more tangible understanding of “site-specificity”: from political conflict to the minutiae of everyday life, elements can be reorganized and reimagined in an “event,” extending through the continued actions of participants.

Evolving from an uncertain “visitor” and “assistant” role to becoming a co- initiator of field recordings and live improvisation, I became aware of my shifting identity and recognized the complexity of how art intervenes in society. Moving forward, Luo and I continue to revisit and expand the related recordings and documentation, striving to provoke broader reflection on urban spaces, social structures, and the possibilities of individual agency through sound and storytelling.