Zhao’s directorial debut, STREET LIFE, which explored the lives of homeless Chinese living on the backstreets of Shanghai, premiered at Austria’s Viennale in 2006. The film screened the following year at Berlin’s Globale Film Festival, and at the Rome Asiatica Film Mediale, where it won the City of Rome Prize.
GHOST TOWN, Zhao Dayong’s second film, won an Independent Spirit Award at the 5th China Documentary Film Festival, an unofficial film forum held in Beijing in May 2008. Zhao is currently in post-production on his third documentary, MY FATHER’S HOUSE, which deals with the growing African population in Guangzhou through the story of an underground Nigerian church. His first experimental film, ROUGH POETRY, will screen at this year’s Vancouver International Film Festival.
After graduating from China’s Lu Xun Art Academy in 1992, where he studied oil painting, Zhao worked for a number of years as a professional artist and advertising director. He was also founding editor of Culture & Morals, a journal for the contemporary arts in China.
SELECTED FILMOGRAPHY
Street Life
2006, 98 min, documentary
Ghost Town
2008, 172 min, documentary
Rough Poetry
2009, 50 min, experimental
My Father’s House
2009, 77 min, documentary
