The Grand Tour · 2026 China Academy of Art (CAA) Graduation Season has come to a successful close. Graduates from 20 academic units responded to the times with art and explored the future through creativity, unfolding a youthful narrative of ideals, journeys, and growth across the city and campus, transforming Hangzhou into an open art venue that gathers intellectual power, creativity, and action.
The China Academy of Art is proud to launch the "Youth Insights" series, which continues to focus on topics such as avant-garde experimentation, humanities and technology, rural academies, A better China, rooted construction, people-centered, poetic cinema, visual sinology, Eastern design, and overseas insights. The series closely follows how young creators measure the world with their footsteps and respond to the times with their works. Between every departure and arrival, we jointly witness the grand explorations and boundless possibilities of a new generation of artists.
出将入相·Opera Offstage
Zhou Zhaohui, He Haoxuan, Cao Jingshan
School of Innovative Design
Advisors:
Hu Xiaochen, Chen Mengyang, Chen Tianyi
Category:
Digital Imaging, Installation Art
Dimensions:
450x400x320cm
Opera Offstage incorporates the "bridge-building" (daqiao) structural technique from Kunqu opera into a digital design framework, rendering the installation itself as a legible "dramatic vignette" in which the audience is transformed from passive observers into active participants. The title Opera Offstage originally denotes the two doorways on the traditional opera stage—one for entrances, the other for exits. The work comprehensively presents both the onstage spectacle and the backstage mechanisms, along with the full orchestration of stage direction. In doing so, it deconstructs the conventional theatrical presentation and reorients the viewing experience from a unidirectional perspective to a multi-directional, immersive one, realizing the classical aesthetic ideals of being "observable, contemplatable, and traversable." Through the integration of physical installation, projection, interactive elements, scale models, and exhibition space, the work reconstructs the narrative of the renowned Kunqu piece Zhong Kui Marries Off His Sister. By presenting this narrative through digital means, it generates a novel mode of Kunqu engagement while simultaneously producing an effect of defamiliarization (Brechtian alienation) with respect to the traditional operatic form.
Advisor's Message
Opera Offstage takes the traditional Kunqu "bridge-building" (daqiao) technique as its creative motif, transforming the classical stage-directing vocabulary of "entering as the general, exiting as the minister" (chujiang ruxiang) into the structural logic of digital interaction design. The creative concept is deeply rooted in traditional artistic grammar, demonstrating a solid foundation in cultural research. The work breaks away from the "single-perspective" viewing framework of traditional theater. Through physical installation, it organically interweaves imagery, interaction, models, and exhibition space, shifting the audience from passive spectators to active participants. Within an immersive narrative that is "observable, contemplatable, and wanderable," the audience fully experiences both the onstage performance and backstage operations of Zhong Kui Marries Off His Sister. This deconstruction and reconstruction of operatic narrative space not only reveals a profound understanding of Kunqu performance aesthetics but also showcases the unique advantages of digital media in revitalizing traditional performing arts. The work comprehensively integrates multiple dimensions—installation design, interactive narrative, and spatial choreography—demonstrating strong systematic coherence and completeness. It fully embodies the interdisciplinary creative capacity of the Art and Technology program, offering a compelling and innovative paradigm for the digital dissemination of Kunqu opera.
Team Members
Zhou Zhaohui — Graduated from the Department of Art and Technology, School of Innovative Design, China Academy of Art. Led project organization, planning, documentation, and installation construction. Developed the overall narrative script and designed a Kunqu exhibition installation that merges physical installation with digital imagery to deliver a renewed experience of Kunqu appreciation.
He Haoxuan — Graduated from the Department of Art and Technology, School of Innovative Design, China Academy of Art. Responsible for storyboard composition and animation production. Employed motion capture technology to extract movement data from professional Kunqu performers, preserving the unique rhythmic essence of Kunqu while enabling its digital reinterpretation.
Cao Jingshan — Graduated from the Department of Art and Technology, School of Innovative Design, China Academy of Art. Handled asset modeling and utilized the Houdini Vellum physics engine for simulation, achieving the visual realization of digital Kunqu costume design.
