TILL ASHES
TURN INTO PINES
Experimental documentary, Colour HD, 9mins., 2025
Series: Ripple Ripple Rippling film trilogy
Co-Directed by Jingru (Cyan) Cheng, Chen Zhan, and Mengfan Wang
Cinematography by Chen Zhan
Editing by Jingru (Cyan) Cheng and Chen Zhan
As the final part of the RIPPLE RIPPLE RIPPLING film trilogy, this short experimental documentary explores the inarticulacy of deep connections between matter, life forms, and humans.
It centres on elderly women in Shigushan village—often widowed and living alone—who sustain themselves by tending family pinewoods: gathering needles for cooking fuel, trading sap for modest income, or selling trees to local veneer factories. Through these timber products, they remain entwined in the material flows between countryside and city. Yet this forest-based livelihood is increasingly precarious, threatened by accidental fire, snow disasters, and urban expansion.
The film traces the women’s relationship with the pinewoods, foregrounding themes of fragility, reciprocity, reincarnation, and transformation embedded in everyday moments. Embracing ethnographic fragmentation through cinematic juxtaposition, it privileges affective resonance and multiple perspectives over linear narrative.
Ripple Ripple Rippling