Observing Shenzhen: one-day fieldwork practice
A one-day workshop to explore Shenzhen with students of Master of Arts Creative Media at School of Creative Media of City University of Hong Kong.
When
20 Feb 2025 - 10am-5pm
Where
Futian District, Shenzhen
What we will do
This field trip will begin at the “Blue Bookstore”, the new permanent space of the UABB Biennale in Shenzhen, and initiate an unplanned journey or dérive through various undisclosed locations in Shenzhen. The tour is an exploration of the socio-technological landscape of Shenzhen through a hands-on exercise on fieldnote-taking and urban observation. Participants are invited to follow the prompts and fieldnote exercises in Nicolas Nova’s Exercices d’observation
Schedule
- 10:30am : meet at 蓝书坊 xUABB 城市驿站 广东省深圳市福田区景田北三街 56 号景蜜公园内
- 11am intro / presentation of the work
- 12am: fieldwork starts - head to 华强北 (huaqiangbei)
- 3pm: meet / debrief at the cafe in Huaqiangbei Museum - 福田区华强北路 1058 号华强北现代之窗大厦五楼 - F5, Huaqiangbei Xiandaizhichuang Building, 1058 Huaqiangbei Road, Futian District - Metro: Line 2 to Huaqiang North Station (华强北站), Exit E2
- 4pm head back to hk
Who
Organized by
Clément Renaud, Dino Zhang, Dennis De Bel, Damien Charrieras
Participants
Students from Master of Arts Creative Media
How
- read the instructions
- pick one/two exercices to practice
- submit your observation using this form
Related readings
Nova, Nicolas. Observation Exercises. Paris, Premier Parallèle, coll. “Parallel Notebooks / the life of things”, 2022
Renaud, Clément. “Global Entanglements in Digital Territories. The Huaqiangbei District in Shenzhen.” Cities and Digital Technology. Paris: Sciences Po, 2023. link.
O’Donnell, Mary Ann. “From Bamboo Curtain to the Silicon Valley of Hardware.” E-Flux, August 2020. link.
Wang, Yifan, and Changwen Chen. “The Unauthorized Repair of the World - Journal #146.” E-Flux, no. 146 (June 2024). link.
De Bel, Roscam-Abbing (2014). Tales From The Vapourtrail, R&D: A Low End Rich Media Publication, p124-147. link
De Bel. “The Ghosts of Shenzhen” REALTIME: Making Digital China, edited by Clément Renaud, Florence Graezer Bideau & Marc Laperrouza, EPFL Press, 2022. link