Wang Bing – The Most Fearless Chronicler of Contemporary China

Wang Bing is a Chinese director, often referred to as one of the foremost figures in documentary filmmaking. His works focus on the remote areas and the marginalized group that usually neglected by the main stream in China.

On April 8th, 2017, documenta 14, one of the world’s largest art exhibitions, opened in Athens, Greece on the occasion of its 70-year anniversary. Artistic Director Adam Szymczyk and curator Hila Peleg invited Chinese artist Wang Bing to premier his work "15 hours."

This video installation consists of a single 15-hour take shot in a garment factory in China and captures the daily labor of its 300,000 migrant workers and the functioning of its 18,000 production units.

Rigorous and hypnotic, "15 Hours" marks Wang’s most radical meditation on the contemporary meaning of work and the state of labor conditions in present-day China.

As the only Chinese artist that participated in the documenta, Wang Bing held his retrspective at Gloria Kino.

On June 10, 2017, documenta 14 presented a full retrospective of Wang Bing’s films with an accompanying exhibition of archive materials at Gloria Kino in Kassel, where his latest work "Mrs. Fang" was also premiered. BCAF and the Cartier Foundation supported Wang Bing’s filmmaking and international collaboration and promotion.

"Mrs. Fang" chronicles the last 10 days of the life of Fang Xiuying, a bedridden 68-year-old woman who suffers from advanced Alzheimer's disease.

In 2018, BCAF Art Film Fund supported the first retrospective exhibition of Wang Bing in the United States. Screenings include "Mrs. Fang," "15 hours," "Tie Xi Qu: West of the Tracks," "Dead Souls," "Three Sisters," and "Til Madness Do Us Part."

His first feature-length documentary, "Tie Xi Qu: West of the Tracks," was filmed in Shenyang, Liaoning province, documenting an unusual period of social change in the region.

"Three Sisters" tells the story of three sisters living in a village in Yunnan. The impoverished three sisters lived in a small village, having only each together. Although life is hard, it is full of freedom and upward spirit.

The film continues the natural documentary style of Wang Bing, without any external modification and rendering, making it basically a pure 150-minute original ecological image.

Wang Bing travelled a lot to the remote areas in China, as his film "Til Madness Do Us Part" in 2013 took place at Yunnan, Southwest of China and observes the daily activity on one floor of a Chinese mental institution there.

"Dead Souls" is Wang Bing's latest film in 2018. In 2018, its was globally premiered in 71st Cannes Festival as special screening.

"Dead Souls" documents the testimony of survivors of the hard-labor camp in the Gobi Desert in Gansu, China.

Curated by film curator Tom Vick, Freer and Sackler gallery hosted Wang Bing retrospective screening in 2019. The screening includes his recent work, "Mrs. Fang," "Dead Souls," and "Bitter Money."

"Bitter Money" documents daily life of workers in a small factory in Huzhou.