Jingwen XIONG

Mixed Media

The Borrowed Blade is a cross-media artwork, consisting of a 60,000- word wuxia novel and a 45-minute stop-motion live-action short film in an ancient Chinese style. Rooted in real history, it reflects the rise and fall of the late Northern Song Dynasty through individual experiences. Employing a Chinese tragic structure, the work explores the dual collapse of ideals and reality for the individual in the face of grand narratives and institutionalized violence.