Abstract
Abstract In confronting environmental catastrophes, how can we find a medium that can augment the view of these burning issues? How can we unfold the circularity that the seeming insignificance of particles at the micro level is inextricably, in sedimented spatiotemporal layers, linked to the pattern at the macro level? What if our media are found wanting for this task? These are the conundrums that Zhao Liang unpacks in Behemoth (2015) through its figuration of imbalanced ecology and the quest to interrogate the limit of medial visibility. The minimal discernibility of dust demands the film to instead contemplate mountains, bodies, and breaths to find its settled traces in atmospheric pervasion, anti-iconic moments, as well as a scalar narratology. Zhao strategizes to pixelate, splice open, abstract, and scale up and down natural and artificial landscapes that are equally under siege in China's industrialization. These tactics are deployed to better reveal the staggering and stagnating atomic magnitude of our living world in crisis.
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