For all works: www.leileixia.com
PDF version of the portfolio(Click to open)
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film shot in VRChat, 1hr, 1920*1080p
Expect is a sci-fi speculative half documentary half fiction film shot in Virtual Reality (VR) that explores the hidden details behind how disabilities are represented in science fiction literature and media. The film features Chinese actors with disabilities role-playing as sci-fi characters in VR to rewrite, challenge and reimagine the conventional, ableist sci-fi tropes, such as the image of “super-crip” and the transhumanistic tendency to “fix” or eradicate disabilities through the myth of enhancement. As a film made in VR, Expect includes the process of the crew interacting with VR device, which on one hand enable actors to "carry out" things they can't achieve in reality, but on the other hand brought even more difficulties and barriers, ironically reflecting the nature of the failed promise of technology to an accessible future.
Director & Editor & Art Director: Leilei Xia Actor & Script Writer & Modeling Advisor: Zeyu, Stephen Lu, Jun, Yanyan, Kong Kong, Ning Li, Lulu, Leilei Xia Cinematographer: Fanxi Sun, Leilei Xia All the crew are hired and paid with VCU Graduate Research Grant.
https://vimeo.com/939413037/a2c5bb348b
Link to Film . Link to Trailer
The work situates itself in the context of Chinese ideological environment where eugenics, enhancement and development are taken for granted, and even people with disabilities might hold a very ableism mindset in this circumstance. While showcasing discussions around what is accessibilities of a cityscape and why those are important, the film explores how personal belief leads to different speculative futures, and why it is so difficult for an individual to imagine a future without ableism, even if they are people with disabilities themselves. It is a question of whether a person with disabilities can have as much respect and self-recognition even when they are not "super-crip", and the answer requires one to fundamentally challenge the Darwinistic logic in Neoliberalism.
7’20’’, 1920*1080p. Stop-motion animation, 2020.
A girl follows a magician into a world of shadow, only to find that she is trapped in the world of hidden rules. The film is in response to various sexual violence towards women.
Made In Dongbuzhou International Animation Incubator Program.
Video link: https://vimeo.com/509377104
Trailer: https://vimeo.com/50937710
23’10’’, 1920*1080p. Live action with animation, 2019.
A girl, fascinated with gay romance, fell in love with a gay man and started questioning her identity both as a Fujoshi and as a heterosexual girl.
The story is based on several true experiences of my friends and myself who are all addicted to Boys Love culture.
Video Link: https://vimeo.com/338361041
“Empty touch” is a tactile experience I discovered that can simulate the feeling of touching something by reenacting the gesture of touching the object guided, by verbal or visual cues. This project contains a video installation and a workshop series
Video Link: https://youtu.be/LzCTLmiBhfc
11'24'', Two channel video installation, transparent fabric and projections, 2023.
"The Palace" is a combination of tactile experience and visual storytelling. The holographic and immersive experience render the piece both as a tutorial and a narrative, and its narrative perspective is both first person and third person. The plot adapts the story of the Emperor's New Clothes and Buddhist scriptures Śūraṅgama Sūtra; in the Emperor's New Clothes, the emperor is deceived into wearing invisible clothing, but in my story, the emperor voluntarily chooses to do so because he believes that memories from the cherished one are more important than luxurious garments made of jewels. As long as one believes, even in ruins, the treasures in one's heart will not disappear.
https://youtu.be/LzCTLmiBhfc?si=MOO6qhdaMlFaxH2q
workshop，2023-now
Using the same fictional framework of “The Palace”, the workshop is an embodied an interactive journey of the empty touch. The workshop starts with watching the video installation of “the Palace”, and then I acted as the host of “The Palace”, guide participants with various exercises: to touch objects, to extract texture from objects, to touch the space, or to use this method to experience other artworks, such as poems, films, etc.
This workshop has been hosted in UCCA Museum, New York Accent Sisters Book Store, VCUarts Graduate Candidacy Group Exhibition, Shanghai E-flow and Guangzhou Unicorn Screening Space.
