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Ceramic Utopia

Jingdezhen city, which has a history of ceramic manufacturing for more than 1,000 years, is also known as the paradise of workers. For thousands of years, generations of workers have lived and fallen in love, built their families and made ceramics here. At present, there are also such a small group of people amount the city, who live in the scent of clay, love and hate, reproduce and inherit, and who construct a small universe close to but independent from the real world, their works, like stars that have fallen onto the ground, are transformed back into stars by the warmth of their hands and the heat of fire. It’s more likely that these people are stars themselves shining in the sky.
Under the background of this strange era, from those young people, we seem to see the shadow of the ancients Tao Yuanming the pastoral poet of the Eastern Jin Dynasty who lived here 1,600 years ago, he distanced himself from central power, rejected politics, and retired to the pastoral life.
We try to use the relationships which clay with people to make this film, in experimental, non-fictional language, a new form of exploration.

  • Vincent ZHENG
    Director
  • Vincent ZHENG
    Writer
  • Vincent ZHENG
    Producer
  • Yachen WANG
    Producer
  • Ke SHAO
    Key Cast
  • Yu DA
    Key Cast
  • Sisu QIAN
    Key Cast
  • He WANG
    Key Cast
  • Zhi YUAN
    Key Cast
  • Jing-wen WU
    Key Cast
  • Xiao-xue ZHANG
    Key Cast
  • Jun CAO
    Key Cast
  • Ding-xuan LI
    Key Cast
  • Aunt LI
    Key Cast
  • Jian ZHANG
    Key Cast
  • Zeng-hui LI
    Music
  • You-Jie LI
    Director of Art&Photography
  • Vincent ZHENG
    Editor
  • Project Title (Original Language):
    陶瓷烏托幫
  • Project Type:
    Documentary, Experimental, Feature
  • Runtime:
    1 hour 39 minutes
  • Completion Date:
    January 1, 2024
  • Country of Origin:
    China
  • Country of Filming:
    China
  • Language:
    Mandarin Chinese
  • Shooting Format:
    Digital
  • Aspect Ratio:
    16:9
  • Film Color:
    Black & White and Color
  • First-time Filmmaker:
    No
  • Student Project:
    No
  • 55th Visions du Réel International Film Festival Nyon
    Nyon
    Switzerland
    April 12, 2024
    Non-screening
    VdR - Film Market
  • 36th Girona International Film Festival
    Girona
    Spain
    November 4, 2024
    Non-screening
    Honorable Mention
  • Janakpur international film festival
    Janakpur
    Nepal
    February 28, 2025
    Non-screening
    Official Selection
  • Riga Pasaules Film Festival
    Riga
    Latvia
    April 26, 2025
    Main documentary programme
Director Biography - Vincent ZHENG

鄭無邊 Vincent ZHENG was born in 1984 and grew up in a Yi minority village in the Wumeng Mountain, southwest of China, studied and graduated journalism at university, after engaged in near ten occupations, set off to make film in 2011, till now is currently a Independent professional filmmaker, as director, screenwriter, producer. Now work and live in Beijing, China.

Works and Film Festival Awards(excerpted),

Nonfiction Feature “Ceramic Utopia”（2024）
55th Visions du Réel International Film Festival Nyon, VdR - Film Market
36th Girona International Film Festival - Honorable Mention
1st Janakpur international film festival - Official Selection
12th Riga Pasaules Film Festival - Official Selection

Documentary Feature “Reincarnation”（2022）,
7th RapidLion - The South African International Film Festival - Official Selection
2nd Sugar Loaf Film Festival - Best Documentary Award Winner

Short “The Black Sheep”（2021）,
19th Festival international Signes de Nuit - Paris - Jury Award
44th Moscow International Film Festival - Official Selection
26th Capri, Hollywood International Film Festival - Capri Spacial Award
41st Thomas Edison Film Festival - Honorable Mention Award"
8th International Festival Signs of the Night - Bangkok - Main Award
Institut National des Langues et Civilisations Orientales Paris - Permanent collection

Documentary Short “Dialogue”（2016）,
Songzhuang Art Museum's 10th Anniversary Invited Exhibition

Short “The Grassland of Soul”（2012）,
Institut National des Langues et Civilisations Orientales Paris - Permanent collection

Short “Behind the Red Wall”（2011）,
Caochangdi International Film Art ant Music Festival - Opening Film

Add Director Biography
Director Statement

In the process of curating and filming this work, we have adopted a different way of thinking and presenting it, and we try to go under the surface of the image, to find and touch the invisible but real parts hidden in the depths of the earth, and to connect deeply with people, times and soil.
Starting from Jingdezhen, connecting the world.

Clay is the most basic foundation for human bings, it comes from the earth, it is also a part of the earth, and even the earth itself, and it seems to be even more so in ceramics.

We tried to use this "clay" to compose the film, in an experimental way, it does not belong to the fiction, nor the documentary. In the hands and blood of the ceramist, in the kiln fire, and in the air of Jingdezhen city, it seems to be connected to the distant "the Peach Spring beyond this World".