“Unreliable Narrator”

︎︎︎Design, concept and production
Tong Zhou, Jipeng Jing

︎︎︎Date
December 2017

︎︎︎Status
Concept

︎︎︎Location
Barrow (AK)

︎︎︎Instructor
Jimenez Lai, Nile Greenberg

︎︎︎Credits
Pictures by Tong Zhou

︎︎︎Description
“Unreliable Narrator” imagines a arctic city in the form of a single gigantic building in the northern most town in Alaska, Barrow. As a sailor died in whaling season. There are five witness accounts to the same event.

The Mayor’s City - “The mayor was in his office when he heard the gun shot. He organized this whaling crew three days ago in public welfare department. On his way home he actually heard an argument between the dead sailor and the crew but he just ignored. In his luxury villa down the city, he told himself, the incoming whaling will just be fine. Then he went to his secret apartment to meet his lover.”

The Dealer’s City - “The alcohol dealer was on the stairway when he knows the murder. His business is illegal so he hid the vodka somewhere in the cemetery. Then he passed the hotel and informed some of his buyers that he will be gone. He checked the loading dock, trying to identify the dead man to see if it is the man who bought some vodka three days ago. Then he runs to the end of the city, trying to escape with giant cargo elevator there.”

The Wife’s City - “Wife was in the school when she hears a gun shot. Then she runs out towards a secret hallway. She only takes a glimpse in the circle plaza to see how people react to the incident. After all, she had a fierce quarrel with his husband before he went whaling. Finally she arrives loading dock, to see a dead whale and his dead husband.”

The Child’s City - “The child was in the commercial street when he heard the gun shot. He went back his home in a normal apartment. Nobody’s there. He couldn’t believe it’s his dad so he went to the church to pray.” The

Friend’s City - “The sailor’s friend heard the gunshot when he’s on patrol in the prison. Three days ago, the sailor visited him in his apartment Police dormitory and told him he felt himself in danger. Now the sailor died, his friend doesn’t trust anyone, determining to find out why. He runs on the people mover, heading to every single apartment that may be involved in this incident.”

The city is a whole comprised of the parts, but, each unreliable narrator can only ever experience so much of the whole, and only retain fragments of the parts. To them, what they retain in their experiences is as good as the whole building. The unreliable narrators construct partial realities, collaging the parts they know the way a filmstrip is spliced from a series of unrelated parts.

A tribute to Ralph Erskine’s Arctic Town.