Rock 77

Experience the live version here: http://ningxiaz.github.io/rock77/

In the very beginning, the relationship between one’s past and present is the general direction I wanted to pursue. I often find it hard to reconcile between the past and present, since they’re so different, but they’re both part of me. I wonder if there’s a way to blend them together, making them at peace.

Then I thought of the idea of a Chinese character collage of albums I listened to, since it has a cultural twist that resonates with me a lot. I grew up in China. I had never been abroad until I reached my twenties. But through music and art, I developed a keen interest in western alternative cultures. Now I live in the US, somehow I learned to appreciate my own culture more, and came to realize the cultural roots in me.

In this work, I laid the album art in either the form of the Chinese characters (摇滚，meaning Rock ‘n’ Roll), or a timeline. In the Chinese character collage, one can flip through each album over and see a photo of me when I was listening to that album. In the timeline view, the albums form a timeline of their releases. The bottom timeline demonstrates the times when I listened to certain albums. One can see the mapping between two timelines through interactions.