Linear Rhythm A Portrait of Three Artists

1990
23m

Three British Chinese artists explore the influences of cultural displacement, repression, and politics on their writing and painting.

Director Rosa Fong examines the life and work of three British Chinese artists: writer-actor Lucy Sheen, Guyanese-born poet Mei-Ling Jin and artist Qu Lei Lei. Rejecting a conventional documentary style in favour of a more experimental approach, Fong tasks each artist with responding to questions and prompts, such as "Childhood", "Influences", "Difficulties" and "Why Do You Paint / Act / Write?". The artists respond in their chosen medium of drama, poetry and painting — revealing a diversity of experience and worldview within the narrow categorisation of "British Chinese".

A look at three British Chinese artist/performers working in UK.

Chinese Britain

From restaurants and supermarkets to colourful New Year celebrations, explore how television has represented British Chinese communities through the decades.

The dynamic dragon dances of Lunar New Year are an annual fixture on our television screens. Like Carnival or Diwali, this point in the calendar offers regional news crews across the country an opportunity to capture colour and spectacle on our doorstep. The history of Britain's Chinese communities is centuries-long, but the wave of postwar immigration in the 20th century coincided with the rise of television, and over the ensuing decades local news has reported on this community, with a mixture of curiosity and novelty, for an implied majority white British audience.

This collection brings together several of these reports, most of which are anchored in areas where British Chinese communities are most visible: restaurants, supermarkets and, naturally, New Year celebrations. And yet, despite the undeniable contribution that this community has made to the changing landscape of British society, there is a dearth of opportunities for British Chinese talent on our screens – with the likes of Bert Kwouk, Gemma Chan and Benedict Wong serving as few exceptions to the norm. So, to complement the news items in this collection, there are also personal documentaries and short films by British Chinese filmmakers who turn the camera around, and offer their perspective on life in Britain.