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China, Beijing, I Love You!

Köken Ergun

2023 00:35:00 Indonesia, TürkiyeChinese, English, IndonesianColorStereo16:9HD video
Tags:
Animation, City, Environment, Health, Labor, Landscape, Politics, Social Justice, Technology

Description

China, Beijing, I Love You! is an animated film about extraction of nickel and cobalt along China's Maritime Silk Road. The film focuses on the character of NICKEL DUST who is exiled from her home in Sulawesi Island due to nickel excavations there. On the other side of the world, in the Democratic Republic of Congo, cobalt is being extracted by artisanal miners. Both nickel and cobalt are the main components of batteries used in Electric Vehicle(EV) and mobile phones. As NICKEL DUST and COBALT DUST are shipped to China, on the Maritime Silk Road, and manufactured into EV batteries, we witness the environmental consequences of their extraction, geo-political effects of China’s expansion as well as the worker’s uprisings in nickel smelters on Sulawesi Island. Giving agency to the extracted minerals, and making them the protagonists of the story, the film investigates the geo-political, social and environmental consequences of ambitions for global expansion.

The film is made in collaboration with Danu Fitra.

About Köken Ergun

Köken Ergun is an artist/filmmaker with a background in performing arts. After working with American theater director Robert Wilson, Ergun became involved with video art and film. His films often deal with communities that are not known to a greater public and the importance of ritual in such groups. Ergun usually spends a long time with his subjects before starting to shoot and engages in a long research period for his projects. He also collaborates with ethnographers, historians and sociologists as extensions to his artistic practice. Since 2020, following the Covid pandemic, Ergun has changed his practice by pausing to make films by himself and getting more involved in collaborations with other artists to make installations, fiction and animation films.

His works have been exhibited internationally at institutions including Documenta 14, Paris Triennale, Jakarta Biennial (2015 and 2021), Kathmandu Triennale, Martin Gropius Bau, SALT, Garage Moscow, Para-Site Hong Kong, Artspace Sydney, Stedelijk Museum Bureau Amsterdam, KIASMA, Digital Art Lab Tel Aviv, Casino Luxembourg and Kunsthalle Winterthur. His films received several awards at film festivals including the Tiger Award for Best Short Film at the 2007 Rotterdam Film Festival and the Special Mention Prize at the 2013 Berlinale. Ergun’s works are included in public collections of the Centre George Pompidou, Greek National Museum of Contemporary Art, Stadtmuseum Berlin, Australian War Memorial and Kadist Foundation.

Having studied acting at Istanbul University, Ergun completed his postgraduate studies at King's College London (classics) and Bilgi University (art history). He holds a PhD degree from Freie Universität Berlin (performing arts and anthropology).

Ergun is the co-founder of After the Archive?, an Istanbul based initiative that questions the role and function of archives in public memory and KIRIK; a space for people and subjects in the cracks.