“It was 1974, war had lasted for years…” So begins the memory of an old Chinese man who lived through the Khmer Rouge regime in Cambodia. The tightly controlled media left very few images from 1975 to 1979, a period in which millions died, including around 200,000 people of Chinese descent.
The film is a collective imagination of this lost history, built from propaganda footage, disaster images that circulated after the fall of the Khmer Rouge, and 3D reconstruction. Narrated through an autobiographical voice, the work folds a tender personal history into a virtual reality of the recent past, showing how experimental digital images can interweave memory and history.
Process notes
The official project dossier describes an encounter with a forgotten community in Chinese history in France as the starting point. The film builds its image from two extreme forms of narrations: propaganda videos made during the Khmer Rouge period and disaster videos circulated after the fall of the regime. Against these fragments, real-time 3D simulation made with a game engine does not pretend to supply missing proof. It makes a space where the past can seek to be the present again, and where memory appears as a subjective image that still produces the now.
Festivals / screenings
- 2026, Screening: The Silent Tide, Tai Kwun, Hong Kong
- 2025, Fantastic Film Festival, Beijing, China
- 2025, Developing China: Films from the Beijing International Short Film Festival, Program 1, Los Angeles, United States of America
- 2025, Archipelago of Beginnings: Short Films, Cinema Studies Institute, University of Toronto Mississauga, Mississauga, Canada
- 2024, Viborg Animation Festival, Viborg, Denmark
- 2024, Kalakari Film Festival, Dewas, India
- 2024, VITA Chinese Film Festival, Beijing, China
- 2023, KUANDU Film Festival, Taipei, Taiwan
- 2023, RAI Film Festival, London, United Kingdom — RAI & Marsh Short Film Prize commendations
- 2023, A4 x KADIST Video Library Project, A4 Art Museum, Chengdu / online, China
- 2023, Whose Homeland - Shorts programme 03: Ghosts of Diaspora, Sine Screen at LUX, London, United Kingdom
- 2023, Chinese Film and Video Festival Hamburg, Hamburg, Germany
- 2022, South Taiwan Film Festival, Tainan, Taiwan
- 2022, Rolling Youth Film Festival, online, China
- 2022, Image Forum Festival, Tokyo, Japan
- 2022, RIFFA - Regina International Film Festival and Awards, Regina, Canada
- 2022, Chinese Documentary New Director Award, Hangzhou, China
- 2022, Go Short - International Short Film Festival Nijmegen, Nijmegen, Netherlands
- 2022, Ann Arbor Film Festival, Ann Arbor, United States of America
- 2022, Festival L’Europe autour de l’Europe, Paris, France
- 2022, Experiments in Cinema, New Mexico, United States of America
- 2022, Taiwan International Documentary Festival, Taipei, Taiwan
- 2022, WIP - Brave New Humanity Arts & Technology Festival 2022, CYENS Centre of Excellence, Nicosia, Cyprus
- 2021, HiShorts! Film Festival, Xiamen, China
- 2021, Prospectif cinéma 2020-2021, Centre Pompidou, Paris, France
- 2021, DOCA International Documentary Festival, Buenos Aires, Argentina
- 2021, Festival International de Videoarte, Buenos Aires, Argentina — First Prize
- 2021, Chicago Underground Film Festival, Chicago, United States of America — Honorable mention
- 2021, Beijing International Short Film Festival, Beijing, China — Special mention
- 2021, Kassel Dokfest, Kassel, Germany — Golden Key for best short film
- 2021, TRANÅS AT THE FRINGE Festival, Tranås, Sweden
- 2021, IndieCork Festival, Cork, Ireland
- 2021, Shnit Worldwide Shortfilmfestival, Bern, Switzerland
- 2021, Athens International Film and Video Festival, Ohio, United States of America
- 2021, Made in China Festival, Rennes, France
- 2021, Ars Electronica, Linz, Austria
- 2021, Bali International Short Film Festival – Minikino Film Week, Bali, Indonesia
- 2021, Festival Silhouette de Paris, Paris, France
- 2021, Docaviv International Documentary Film Festival, Tel Aviv, Israel
- 2021, 21th Seoul International ALT Cinema & Media Festival, Seoul, South Korea
- 2021, Festival National du Court-métrage étudiant, Paris, France
- 2021, Regensburg Short Film Week, Regensburg, Germany
- 2021, It’s All True International Documentary Film Festival, São Paulo, Brazil
Exhibitions
- 2025, Drifting Across the Screen, Jilu Commune, Shanghai, China
- 2024, Tomorrow’s History, Esea contemporary, Manchester, United Kingdom — Projection, curated by Sine Screen
- 2023, Declaration of the Bitter Land, Modern Art Museum Shanghai, Shanghai, China
- 2022, ONE SONG IS VERY MUCH LIKE ANOTHER, AND THE BOAT IS ALWAYS FROM A FAR, Times Museum, Guangzhou, China
- 2022, Far West: Strange Dreams of Strangers in Strange Lands, UCCA, Beijing, China
- 2022, Eyes of A Newborn, NU Space, Chengdu, China
- 2020, Panorama 22, Le Fresnoy, Tourcoing, France
Links / references
- South Taiwan Film Festival: When the Sea Sends Forth a Forest Official South Taiwan Film Festival programme page.
- Le Fresnoy: When the sea sends forth a forest Le Fresnoy work page for the film in Panorama 22, with production and partner information.
- Shortfilmwire: When the sea sends forth a forest Shortfilmwire film record with synopsis and production credits.
- Taiwan International Documentary Festival: When the Sea Sends Forth a Forest TIDF page for the DOCUMEMORY screening programme.
- Ars Electronica CyberArts 2021: Golden Nica Ars Electronica CyberArts 2021 page for the Golden Nica in Computer Animation.
- Kasseler Dokfest: Golden Key Kasseler Dokfest Golden Key archive listing the 2021 short-film winner.
- film-documentaire.fr: When the Sea Sends Forth a Forest French documentary-film catalogue record with credits, keywords and festival selections.
- Chicago Underground Film Festival: Shorts 2 Chicago Underground Film Festival programme page for the Shorts 2 screening package.
- LA Filmforum: Developing China, Program 1 LA Filmforum programme page for the BISFF-linked Developing China screening.
- LUX: Whose Homeland - Ghosts of diaspora LUX/Sine Screen programme page for the Ghosts of diaspora screening.
- ArtCM: Declaration of the Bitter Land ArtCM exhibition page for Declaration of the Bitter Land, discussing the work in the exhibition context.
- Times Museum / TrueArt: Offshore Spectres Programme note for the Times Museum screening context, with a Chinese curatorial text on the film.
- BCAF New Voice: Liu Guangli interview BCAF interview in which Liu Guangli discusses the film's historical method and source material.
- CathayPlay: When the Sea Sends Forth a Forest CathayPlay platform page carrying the film title and director statement.
- Vimeo: LIVING WITH IMAGES | Virtual Shooting Public process video around the virtual shooting method.