Shanghai - II / Litanies

Preparations:

Mobile Apps and Softwares: 

• Psiphon Pro - VPN on the phone, it worked well - it was free too.
• Lantern - VPN for computer
• Chinese Lite - for quick translations
• Google Translator - really helpful, even if rudimentary - reads chinese text too.
• Offline Google Map for Shanghai since baidu will be in chinese
• WeChat for connecting with friends quickly
• QR code Reader because everything has a QR code
• ShareIt - for android users, so that you can share apps without google play. Google Play will not work
• Explore Shanghai - Shanghai Metro Map app
• Have a non-gmail email id like Rediff or Yahoo or Hotmail etc.
• Good to have Alipay paperless cash or some such service - easy to rent bikes and make payments

List of Museums and galleries (and the exhibitions) I visited in Shanghai:

The Long Museum

The China Government Museum

The Power Station of Art - Lecture by Apichatpong, Toyo Ito, Danish Design

The Minsheng Art Museum:

'Listening to Transparency'
Artists:
Pierre Alain Jaffrennou, Michel François, Pascal Frament, Fujui Wang, Dominique Blais, Stéphane Borrel, Christophe Lebreton, Denys Vinzant, Pierre-Laurent Cassière, Matt Coco, Yann Orlarey, Jean-François Estager, Henri-Charles Caget, Julie Vacher, Dania Reymond, Iuan-Hau Chiang, Christian Rizzo, Gregory Chatonsky, William Anastasi, Thierry De Mey, Luc Ferrari, Manon De Boer, Thomas Leon, Li Yuhang, Deng Yuejun, Xiao Yu

The Urban Planning Museum

The Tongji Museum

Others:








at the Power Station of Art

'Home and Lights' by Apichatpong Weerasethakul

Apichatpong Weerasethakul is a well known Indonesian architect turned film maker who presented his work at Power Station of Art while I was visiting. Here are some thoughts that I took away from his lecture.

Memory and light are malleable. Same can be said about history and storytelling. 

Identity as a function of fact and fiction... Our identity keeps on changing since we are also transforming. 

24 fps in cinema is a very rudimentary form of medium. Cinema, TV, mobile phones just put a frame around images.

Parts of things which are not visible to us even when out eyes are open. 

For me dream and cinema are similar. I face dream has much more potential. 

Dreaming is the only action which has freedom. No one can control it. Even ourselves! 

Length of cinema cycles evolved from the length of stages of dream. In dream you have 4 stages that last about 90 minutes...which is also almost the length of the film... 

Jungle is a place where you don't need to follow rules. Cinema is also one such space... 

Seeing animal sculptures in fireworks. 

Immersing the spectator in darkness. 

The colour of the movement is black...

Travel as a trigger to go in different cultures and slow down and concentrate and look at the world like a kid and be skeptic. 

To press the button in the elevator and not feel the pressure of reaching your floor.

Walk instead of running wherever you can...

Works by Apichatpong:

Fireworks (archives)

http://www.ago.net/apichatpong-weerasethakul-fireworks-archives

Future vehicles

Tropical Malady, film
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tropical_Malady

Cemetery of Splendour, film
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cemetery_of_Splendour