Prop Design for: exhibition Our Mountains Are Painted On Glass
2023, 2024
Project:Propaganda-themed posters based on Michelle Williams Gamaker’s film Thieves (2023). Designed for Michelle Williams Gamaker’s solo exhibition Our Mountains Are Painted On Glass (2023, 2024) at the South London Gallery and Bluecoat Liverpool.
Role:Graphic Designer on a 1-year work placement with Michelle Williams Gamaker’s film production for Thieves (2023). I was also the Illustrator of the artwork used in the posters.
Concept:Anna May Wong’s dual cultural identity; the Chinese-American mixed ethnicity.
The original “Join the Annamaytons!!” poster in the film was bilingual in English and Chinese, reflecting Anna May Wong’s Chinese-American ethnicity. But for the exhibition, I split them into two separate posters; one in English, following the mimicking the famous propaganda poster “America Needs YOU”; and the other in Chinese, following the Chinese propaganda style which was popular in WW1.
Left: A re-design of the “Join the Annamaytons!!” poster. Features the face of Anna May Wong (played by Dahong Hongxuan Wang), some rice straws (referring to the film “the Bang Straws”(2022), the previous sequel to the film “Thieves”(2023) ) and the bolded text reading “JOIN THE ANNAMAYTONS!!”
Right: A new poster for the exhibition. Features the “lotus hands”, which appears in the choreography of a performance within the film “Thieves”. The letters reads “加入黄蒙軍・黄柳霜需要你”, which means “Join the Annamaytons: Anna May Wong Needs You” in Chinese.
Screenshots from Bluecoat’s Youtube video interviewing the artitst Michelle Williams Gamaker.