In the summer of 2012, an extraordinary team of creatives from Los Angeles and New York City embarked on an ambitious video project to dish up insight into the skyrocketing alternative art, fashion, music, and nightlife culture in Beijing, China.
Through blog posts and bite-size video-stories, The Secret Guide to Alternative Beijing offers world travelers an inspiring insider’s view into one of the most exciting and rapidly expanding contemporary art, music and fashion scenes in the world. The Secret Guide covers everything from the city’s major attractions to offbeat art galleries and shops, interviews with key innovators and influencers in Beijing’s creative community, as well as practical information and more.
TSGTAB was my second Kickstarter effort. It raised over $10,000 and offered a variety of fun contributor incentives, including Instax snaps, personalised photo–hunts from disposable cameras, tea straight from China, and Skype portfolio reviews from your truly. In addition to curating, photography, hosting and co-directing the video features, I was in charge of all Secret Guide branding, as well as the design of all its promotional materials, and promotion, overall. Here is an interview I conducted during the fundraising campaign, where I talk about my inspiration for the project, and here is another, with PMC mag.
Traveling to China for a month of non-stop filming was an experience not for the faint of heart. Our shooting agenda was demanding – a tightly-packed, grueling production, with as many as three features scheduled per day. That said, our unique experiences and the resulting content are absolutely worth it. The Secret Guide is ongoing, with more in the pipeline and plenty of watching and reading to be done over at its official website, where we’ve released over thirty assorted videos and blog posts. To get you started, here is a guided mini-tour of my top six features so far.
At the top of this post is Tuned in at Yu Gong Yi Shan – How does twenty-first-century indie music sound when it’s only been around for twenty years? We went to Beijing’s leading indie music label’s fifth anniversary concert to find out. This is also where I shot many of the photos featured in our Beijing Style Capsule – one of the Kickstarted contributor rewards.
Getting Close to Ren Hang – we get an unprecedented, behind-the-scenes look at one of China’s most controversial photographers (and creator of my half-naked dove portraits). WARNING – this video is highly NSFW, so please use your discretion when watching.
Wonderland – Beijing’s Forgotten Industrial Playground – Warm September afternoon, just twenty miles outside of Beijing. A soft breeze rustles sprawling corn fields, rolls over unfinished cement turrets and whistles through rusted, skeletal beginnings (or are they remains?) of an enchanted fortress. Filming this feature was a dream come true for me – I’d been inlove with Wonderland from afar since seeing beautiful photos of it online. We were lucky to get this chance – Wonderland’s carcass has, sadly, been destroyed.
DongHuaMen – Beijing’s Culinary Gauntlet – Donghuamen is a night market specializing in exotic, unusual snacks, catering primarily to out-of-towners. I braved endless rows of steaming pots and mystery meats to sample locusts, snake skin, a hairy spider, a scorpion, and perhaps the scariest of all snacks, stinky tofu – all for your entertainment.
Studio Visit with Zhang Qiang – Those interested in veering even further off the beaten path during their visit to the Caochangdi Art Village will love IOWA Collective: a complex of greenhouses just outside of the Caochangdi perimeters, converted into artist live-and-work spaces, with corn growing all around.
I end our Top Six Tour with a short we filmed in Shanghai, just one day before heading to Beijing. I’m especially happy with the pacing here and think we succeeded at conveying the energy of the magical teahouse.
Stopping Time in a Hidden Teahouse in Shanghai – Tea culture is ingrained in China’s history and and has a bright future, too – especially if you ask Lin Min, the proprietress of a teahouse hidden in an unassuming Shanghai apartment complex. It’s no exaggeration to say that entering the apartment feels like taking a step out of time. This is where we got teas for our Kickstarter supporters!
