Tianxingzhou – a sandbar that began as a deserted island, was over 800 years of history and has flooded frequently since it took shape. Today, it is one of the largest sandbars on the Yangtze section, but all that remains of the island are old people, old houses, and large reed beds.

Recently, it has continued to influence the regional landscape and the migration of human activity in processes unnoticeable to humans and continues to drift downstream at a speed that cannot be surveyed by the naked eye. Every year, during the dry season, the head of the island reveals a vast desert made of sediment transported from the upper reaches of the river, while during the high season, the head of the island is the first section to disappear and sink into the river, and therefore no buildings, crops, or farmland can remain, creating a deserted scene. At the end of the island, people could build embankments and houses, plant fruits and vegetables, and cultivate farmland because they were far away from the direct scouring force, presenting a completely different geomorphological feature and trajectory of human activities than at the head of the island.

The artist has been to the island many times recently, and she gradually feels the connection between this sandbar, which has undergone a long period of sedimentation and drift, and her encounter, in which this isolated sandbar has become an embodied image of her homeland. Therefore, in this double-frequency video, the artist attempts to use this sandbar as an entry point to the land that is connected to her life. The two scenes in the video span two seasons, the high water season and the low water season, and present the image of red brick powder floating along from the end of the island in the high water season to the head of the island in the low water season, as the artist tries sending it through the movement of the wind to the source of the sandbar, which has disappeared due to erosion.

In this video, the artist strings together spatial scenes that span time, juxtaposing the forces of nature at different times – the growing vegetation and the vast desert, the working steel mills and clusters of high-rise houses, the river flowing downstream and the wind blowing upstream, the red bricks that first built the land and the red powder that collapsed and demolished it… they are here entwined and reshaped by unseen forces, forming a breath that rises and falls.

天興洲——這個初為荒島的沙洲，距今已有八百多年的歷史，自出具雛形以來便頻發洪水。如今是長江段上最大的沙洲之一，但島上只剩下老人、舊宅、和大片的蘆葦叢。

近年來它以人類無法注意到的進程持續的影響著區域的地貌和人類活動的遷移，並以肉眼無法勘測的速度持續地向下游漂移。 每年的枯水期，洲頭會顯露出由上游搬運至此的泥沙，聚集成的廣闊沙漠;而到了漲水期，洲頭也是最早消失沉寂在江水中的一段，因此無法保留任何的建築農作物和農田，形成荒無人煙的場景。 而在洲尾由於遠離直接沖刷的作用力量，人們能夠建造堤岸、房屋，種植蔬果、耕種農田，呈現和洲頭完全不同的地貌特徵和人類活動
軌跡。

藝術家近年來多次上島，她逐漸感受到這片經歷了漫長沉積和漂移的沙洲與她自身遭遇的相連，在這個過程中這片孤島沙洲變成了具身的故土形象。因此在這段雙頻錄影中，藝術家試圖以這片沙洲為切口，進入與她生命相連的土地。 錄像中的兩段畫面橫跨了漲水季和枯水季的兩個時節，呈現了紅磚粉順著漲水季節的洲尾飄向枯水季節的洲頭畫面，藝術家試圖通過風的移動將它送到因沖刷而消失的沙洲源頭。

在這部錄像中藝術家將跨越了時間的空間場景串聯起來，將不同時期的自然力量並置其中—— 那些生長起來的植被和大片的沙漠，對岸正在工作的鋼廠機器和成群的高樓住宅，向下游流動的江水和向上游吹去的風，以及最初建造這片土地房屋的紅磚和坍塌拆毀的紅色粉末… 它們在此被不可見的力量纏繞並重塑，形成一漲一落的呼吸。

Han Qian was born in Wuhan, China and now lives and works in Wuhan. She received her B.A in Accademia di belle arti di Roma, Italy and M.A in École Nationale Supérieure des Beaux-arts de Paris, Paris, France. Han Qian’s articles have appeared in LEAP, Boyan Art, Jiazazhi, Special edition Project, ARTBBS, AnayaPost, and other media. Participated in the 2022 residency program at Goethe-Institut Beijing in collaboration with Cache Space; has given lectures and screenings for schools and institutions such as Guangzhou Academy of Fine Arts, Goethe-Institut Beijing, He Art Museum, West Bund Museum; Jiazazhi; shortlisted for the 2022 OCAT Research-Based Curatorial Project in Beijing.

Han Qian’s work as well as reflecting on individual perception and identity memory through multiple times and the threads of history. Attempting to present her creative projects as a constant journey between the past and the present, searching for the possibility of symbiosis and dialogues with the external world and inner experience. The artist often works with her video through photographs, documents as well as writing, the act of collecting and textual writing is a recurring metaphor in her creative practice, and the search for different perceptions of source time always pulls in her writing. The artist employs various mediums such as video, installation, performance, and text.

Her current work revolves around the context of her three-generational family history, examining the genealogy of natural resources, the political discourses behind this historical narrative, and the fates of the individuals who inhabited it.