The Narrative of a Sisyphean Land

This is a narration of a pice of land, located at the end of Zhuoshui River. After the establishment of the Sixth Naphtha Cracker Complex on the other side of the bank, the agricultural land have been facing its fate of declination. However, on the extremely polluted dying land, farming and river ceremonies continue; residents hold river rituals to pray for a good harvest, while farmers plant in the contaminated soil only to harvest inedible crops . The daily farming and ritual routines seem to be in vain. Comparing to the fading land, what anchors people's unchanging persistence and beliefs? The people here have accepted the fate of the land they are attached to, meanwhile despising the harshness of the environment. With the attitude of “rebellions”, they sustain their daily planting and rituals. The seemingly meaningless attachment to the land and the absurd futilities, are the counteraction against the fading of the land. The meaning of fading has since lost its meaning on them. While the land fading, how to preserve the emotion and identity toward the land? The relationship between people and land is transformed into a modern farming method; there is a 50-year restoration and replacement among the life cycle of the people, dwellings and the land. people plant decontamination plants in contaminated land, waiting for the field to be purified; as a substitute for the land, the newly built greenhouse will be integrated into the village context. When all the brick houses collapse, steel and glass become the preservation of the space memory. The bricks and tiles will eventually buried in the fields with the ancestors. When the new generations of farmers moved in, at the other side of the field will be the eternal resting place of the predecessors and space memories.