Gesar (2017- ongoing)

ཀྱཻ། འདོད་དོན་ཀུན་འགྲུབ་དགྲ་ལྷ་མཐུ་བོ་ཆེ།། རིག་གསམ་པདྨའི་སྒྱུ་འཕྲུལ་སེང་ཆེན་རྒྱལ།། ནོར་བུ་དགྲ་འདུལ་བཀའ་སྡོད་ཕོ་ཉར་བཅས།། གསོལ་ལོ་མཆོད་དོ་བསམ་དོན་ལྷུན་འགྲུབ་མཛོད།།

“King Gesar” is the most well-known Tibetan ethnic epic in China and the longest of its kind in human history, it tells the legend of the King Gesar, a half-human half deification hero who was the reincarnation of Padmasambhava in Tibetan Buddhism. He defeated evil demonds and enemies, saved many lives of its people, and unified a hundred of tribes into the Kingdom of Ling. Narrated and passed down orally by charismatic minstrels and Tibetan Buddist Lamas since A.D.11th Century, the epic survived numerous social revolutions of modern China, it reflects history, social-political transition and people's way of life in the Tibetan Plateau.
From 2017 onward, I have been tracing many clues from the epic of King Gesar, travelled to locations and relics in Qinghai, Sichuan and Tibet, which believed to be the birthplace of the epic, exploring the bundary geographically and mentally between surreal myth and current reality.
The project Gesar is aim to document the spiritual and complex socio-political landscape of modern Tibetan ethnic group in western China, base on metaphors from the ancient epic. To put questions on how people looks at the past of their heritages? In what way shapes their ethnic identity? If the epic was the narrative of ancient tibetan world, what is the story now for the new era and generation? What has changed from lifestyle and religious beliefs, to relationship within their own community, on what remains or has been lost for people who live in this territory by constant social transition and modernization.