The Hakka is an ethnic group who regionally originate from migration. The typical round-shaped architectures embody the Hakka culture's reverence for community living and reincarnation. Hakka walled houses, made from local materials, serve as both defensive forts and community buildings. These structures can unite dozens of families or an entire clan within one building. The outer walls are constructed from clay, earth, lime, and stone, while the inner structure features vertically arranged bamboo, serving as the bone structure. Conflicts between different clans and the Sino-Japanese wars influenced the architecture, enhancing its defensive function. The buildings are divided vertically, with each family occupying two or three rooms per floor, depending on the structure of the transverse walls.
In 2020, I visited a Hakka village called Mantin (meaning “full-field” in Chinese), where my grandpa was born and raised, to pay respects to my ancestors. This journey embodied the cycle of nightmares and fears that underpin my artistic practice.
With urbanization, people pursued more convenient living environments and better economic conditions, leading to a gradual shift of the rural population to cities. While walking around and talking with local people, I noticed various abandoned buildings, left behind for historical, political, and cultural reasons. Compared to my first visit in childhood, more buildings had turned into ruins. Some "fresh" ruins had not even been covered with thick dust, and the voices of people in the village were far fewer than before.
I was deeply impressed by the village because it was the first time I felt I had found the origin of my interests in ruins, monsters, and nightmares. This interest persists today and is a part of my self-mediation in the present. Anxiety triggers my nightmares, in which I visit the ruins and encounter other monstrous spirits living in remote territories.
A short documentary of this experience in the Hakka village marks the beginning of my long-term artistic practice and exploration of dwelling spaces, nostalgia, dreams and collective memories.
Trailer
Memories from the first visit in 2006
The ancestral house in the village is a traditional Hakka roundhouse. The Hakka people believe in "more children, more blessings." That's why my great-grandfather had two wives and eleven children, making it a big family.
My fingertips rubbed against the rusty copper on the door lock as my feet skimmed over the sagging threshold.
The air in the yard was humid, with steamy moss growing on the ground, posts, and handrails.
The space upstairs was cramped, and the smell was different in the dark. It was a musty smell of wood.
I could hear the sound of dripping water coming from the other end of the corridor. Rain leaked from the layered black tiles down to the wooden railing, making the wood soft and brittle. I broke off a small piece of wood and hid it in my pocket. The damp wood gradually soaked my pocket.
The family sat in a circle, in the halo of an old chandelier, whose dusty shade swayed lightly in the wind.
“When we were little,” Grandpa said, “we used to play hide-and-seek in the house. This house had more than fifty rooms, so it was hard to find people. Sometimes, we hid, we waited, we fell asleep, and still, nobody found us. When we woke up at dusk, we could smell dinner on the wind.”
When I looked back at the house, I noticed we were separated by a layer of glass. Suddenly, I sensed that the old house was actually a person. The thick black tiles were his unwashed hair; the uneven rammed earth wall was his weather-beaten face; the abyss-like broken windows were his sad eyes. The old bush at the gate waved me goodbye.
"It's time to leave the village behind and get back to my real life," I told myself. But then I felt it—the wood inside my pocket. It still retained the warmth of the old hou
