Project Descriptions
Emma Page | Painting and corresponding analysis (Google Docs)
Dream of Ding Village Painting & Writing Piece
The painting that I created represents Professor Ding’s apology to the villagers on the night of Ma Xianglin’s performance and death. I used part of the apology that he said, “As you can see, I’m not a young man. I kneel before you now, in my sixth year, to apologize to everyone on behalf of my oldest son, Ding Hui. I know a lot of you go infected from selling him your blood, and he is to blame for that. But please remember that my youngest boy has the fever too, and my twelve year old grandson died after being poisoned. Seeing as how it is come to this, I hope you can find it in your hearts to forgive us” (Yan, 2005, p.55-56). I then was able to get help from one of my dad’s friends who is Chinese to help me translate it. It was important to me that I translated the apology because Ding Village was in China. The translation symbolizes the Chinese culture, Ding Village, and the Ding family. The imagery from the apology that stuck out to me was when Professor Ding kowtowed three times. When someone of the Chinese culture kowtows three times, it shows respect, although kowtow is not always positive for people outside of the Chinese culture. For example, some Americans will say, “I won’t kowtow to them.” Kowtowing would show someone has superiority or control of you. Since Ding Village is of the Chinese culture, the silhouettes of three kowtows on the painting symbolize the respect that Professor Ding had for Ding Village and the Villager. He wanted the best for all of them and had hope even though they all had the fever. The quote on the piece is in gold. The shimmery gold really makes the apology pop out and relates to the book. Qiang’s coffin that he was transferred to before he was buried with his wife, Lingzi, was a gold coffin. The apology being the color gold symbolizes Qiang because Professor Ding and Qiang have a special relationship. The background is painted red to represent blood from the blood selling that Hui started and Professor Ding had apologized for. Also, Professor Ding’s grandson, Qiang, died from the fever.
Anna Berquist | Video discussing research (Google Drive)
The more you take, the more it flows
While reading this novel, there was a recurring phrase that really made me think. The government was explaining to the citizens why they should donate their blood, and they mentioned the phrase “The more you take, the more it flows”. The elder of the village did a demonstration to prove this phrase. He dug a hole in the ground and it soon started to fill with water. The more he took out of the hole, the more water filled it up. I wanted to know if this same idea applied to blood as well.
Dane Gemig | Model of Ding Village
My project is a lego model of Ding village. Basing the village off of elements from the novel, I created a scale model of the village square. The model used different types of lego bricks but mostly single one by one pieces were used. Using a new building style, the village turned out really well. All the colors used created texture to the piece that brought it to life.
Lynee Wang and Amanda Roche | Model of the ornate coffins (Google Slides)
Butterfly Lovers Coffins
In the final moments of their lives, Ling Ling loved Uncle and Uncle loved Ling Ling. Both knew that their deaths were inevitable but still chose to make the most out of it. In spite of their relatives, they moved in together, cherished each other’s company, and copulated with one another. When one died, the other followed suit. The caskets created are a replication of the actual caskets that were described in the book. Although, the caskets in the book were described as having “classical landscapes with mountains, rivers and heavenly clouds” and “Big-city scenes with broad avenues and narrow streets, streams of cars and pedestrians, bridges and interchanges that looped like intestines,” our caskets do not have the most accurate portrayal of the originals. When creating the caskets, it was evident that including all the details was way out of our skillset. Instead of carving out all the extravagant, dignified details, we chose to include the easier designs to carve and the more critical details, such as the People’s Bank of China. Creating the intricate carvings was a tough challenge but the end results please us well. Although the caskets that we created were based on the caskets for Uncle and Ling Ling in the novel, these caskets are also for all the AIDS victims and, unlike uncle and Ling Ling, we hope that they were buried with love and care.
Lily Wang | Model of Ding Village (Google Docs)
Village of Life and Village of Death
This project illustrates two different worlds that are depicted throughout the story. One side is labeled with 命 meaning life as the side is pictured to more prosperous with more trees and white flowers also representing life. The other side is labeled as 死 meaning death as it represents a world no light or hope being pictured with the two gravestones on the tragic death of two lovers and also many others who have unfortunately succumbed to AIDS. The death side is also shown to have dark red roses throughout the land also showing the meaning of death. The ground is painted 2 different colors with one being darker and richer while the other side is lighter as it depicts the soil in the rural village being drained of nutrients over time during the pandemic, similar to how life in the village is also being drained from people. The trees shown only on the life side are used throughout the story as the land shown on the death is barren and lifeless with many people wanting to use the trees to make their own coffins. Some villagers are also shown in the book to be very adamant about sparing the trees as they see it as the only thing that is keeping the spirit of what the village used to be like but the trees were still chopped down, taking away what is left of their village. The blood bank shown on the life side with a red cross is used to symbolise how the villagers had a feeling of hope for a better life as the blood bank had brought about more financial stability for those who donated. Though, at the same time it is used to portray greed as seen with the effects of people opening their own illegally run blood banks and how the consequences filtered down to innocent people who simply wanted a better life. On the death side, the biggest building is used to represent the school as to how many people had to seek refuge when finding out they had contracted AIDS from unsafe blood banks. The little boy in the middle of the death and life world is used to portray the narrator of the story as this character can be used to symbolise life and death as he is narrating the events occurring in the mortal world. The clay model person standing outside of the blood bank is the boy’s father who is shown to be overlooking the village while also thinking about his future. The clay model standing outside of the school is the boy’s grandfather who is shown to be standing outside the school reflecting on what’s to come for the village and how the village had ended up how it is pictured in the death world. There are also 2 bottles of flour shown on the side of the school as shows how people in villages at that point had been desperate to get anything they could with the government starting to cut off their food supply. It is also used to show how people who worked in the school had been stealing the food in order to provide their family with the basic ability to feed themselves as they saw as a way to repay themselves for what they do for everyone living at the school.
Arianna Smith | Mixed Media (color pencil and paint pen) Illustration (Google Drive)
Rose
I drew a rose in a puddle of blood and dripping with blood to signify that something beautiful can always produce something bad, symbolizing that humans can reproduce a disease that can harm a lot of people. The book talks about how the disease in the blood was spread by a human’s mistake. The human, thus, is the rose, and the disease spread by the human is the blood. The disease was spread like blood spreading out, as well.
Kit Kobza | Painting (Google Drive)
Blood Empire Development
This painting is made to represent the development of the blood empire that was shown in Dream of Ding Village, and how it affects everyone. The stream/river is mostly clear and blue: it’s safe for people to drink. However, there is a red spot that is trickling through the water. Nearby there is a village that relies on the river, and a shepherd-like person who is tending to some cattle. They all rely on this clean and clear water source, like how many people rely on blood to help them survive. However, this water is tainted by blood, making it undrinkable, like how the blood from the village would have been tainted with HIV/AIDs. The water in this painting could kill someone, just like tainted blood could kill a sickly or injured person. Along with this, the social hierarchy created by this blood empire can be deadly to a community. Like in the painting. If the cattle become sickly and die, the village loses a main source of food. The connections between the hierarchies in the book and the domino effect that could happen in the painting are connected. Everyone relies on something else to live, so when a village starts losing people to a deadly disease that they don’t exactly know how it spreads, an entire village can collapse.
Grace King | Mixed-Media Illustration (Google Drive)
Greed
I decided to draw a man holding money who has a smile on his face. This man is supposed to represent Ding Hui, who is to blame for the spread of AIDS in the county. He got a lot of money from selling other peoples’ blood and didn’t care that these people who were selling their blood would be sick, the people on the bottom of the piece. They are sick, that is why they are portrayed so sad and depressed. All of the people in the drawing are walking towards the coffin because when they all got sick, all they focused on and cared about was their coffin for when they died. There is a gold coffin in the drawing like the gold coffin that was in the book. The blood from the hand holding the money represents the blood people would sell. Ding Hui is smiling at the top because he is so full of greed and was willing to do anything to get money, not caring who was negatively affected by it.
Moeez Saleem | Block Coded Summary through Scratch (Scratch)
This project uses Scratch to work on coding skills to present an excerpted summary of the novel, Dream of Ding Village.