In 1989 – the same year Chen Qiuchi was involved in the Tiananmen Square protest – William Kentridge released “Johannesburg, 2nd Greatest City After Paris” the first animated short film of his stop-motion series. The soundtrack is composed of Duke Ellington’s music.
From here, the central characters of Kentridge’s subsequent short films are introduced:
Soho Eckstein is a wealthy real estate agent from Johannesburg, indifferent to the well-being of his employees and the emotional needs of his wife. He is seen sitting behind his desk, voraciously consuming food and drinks, with a gloomy and somber gaze fixed on the devastated mining landscape. His alter ego, Felix Teitelbaum, appears naked, facing away, contemplating the landscape.
The short film, made at a time when international pressure on South Africa to abolish apartheid had reached its peak, serves as a reminder that Western societies were once founded on deeply inhumane principles. The critique of the lack of humanity in these operations of pure oppression recalls the artistic poetics of social criticism that characterizes Chen Qiuchi’s work.
