Lei Lei

re-engraved (2024)

The fragile materialities of Yangzhou wood engraving and analog film converge in Lei Lei's fractal portrait of labor and craft. Exploring techniques of light and poetry, wood and celluloid, re-engraved montages demonstrations of expertise with a cacophonou ...

Break no.1 & Break no.2. (2024)

After A Bright Summer Diary (IFFR 2020) and Ningdu (IFFR 2022) we once again welcome Lei Lei to Rotterdam with this compelling tribute to bygone images and memories. As always, the mundane comes alive through a conscientious montage of gorgeous composition ...

A Gift for You (2023)

That Day, on the River (2023)

Searching for the house his father grew up in, director Lei Lei charts the story of a childhood in rural China using a mix of found footage, collage, and animation techniques: a moving account of all the things the father thinks he was not good at. ...

Silver Bird and Rainbow Fish (2022)

"Our family is special", says filmmaker Lei Lei's father Lei Jiaqi. On the audio track of this inventive, poignant essay film he starts to talk about the struggles of his family, amid China's troubled times of the 1960s. When his own father, Lei Ting, is s ...

Ready to play (2021)

Short animation about a running girl by Lei Lei ...

Happy Year of the Rat 2020 (2020)

A Bright Summer Diary (2020)

A boy and his mother sit in a cardboard car in front of painted landscape. This postcard from his childhood is what triggers Chinese artist Lei Lei to go on a journey down the rabbit hole of memory. Put together with his signature style of melancholic coll ...

Breathless Animals (2019)

"What did you dream about and what was your daily life as a teenager?" An older woman recalls her youthful memories in China during the 1970's while unfolding in front of our eyes the recreation of the modern times from the past. ...

Weekend (2018)

With Weekend, the artist and Beijing / LA resident Lei Lei not only displays artistic nostalgia, but also the constant quest for certainty regarding history, family and personal identity. His work can be seen as a type of "creative thinking" on the theme, ...

I Don't Like The Comics You Drew (2018)

Dave draws the first page of his comic book and excitedly shows it to his friend Lei Lei. Lei Lei is not impressed. ...

Hand Colored no.2 (2017)

In 2013, Lei Lei and Thomas Sauvin collected numbers of black-and-white photos from Chinese flea markets and imagined that all of them belonged to one fictional Chinese person. Through rendering, collage, and a cyclical process of hand coloring, scanning, ...

HAFF Leader 2016 (2016)

During production, I have utilized images from a second-hand book. This book was used to train Chinese youths on how to make quick sketches of human figures in the 80s. I have cut out model photos from the book and placed them in potted landscape, attempti ...

Books on Books (2016)

The cutout patterns are from my father's book, Book Cover Collection in the West, which was published in 1988, when Chinese leaders launched their great "Reform" and "Opening Up" to embrace the world. Many leading concepts of book cover design were introdu ...

Missing One Player (2015)

During a mahjong game, a bad situation occurs. Everyone waits for the last player to show up. The three have no choice but to wait and sit there silently in tears. However, they do believe that the fourth player will come. They look up to the sky waiti ...

Animafest Zagreb (2014)

With animation from Lei Lei and beatboxing from Eloi Dequeker, this is the story of "guy with a hat" as he heads to the cinema in the supercar. ...

This Is Not a Time to Lie (2014)

The young Chinese animator also known as "Ray" Lei crafts a hallucinatory short that follows a doe-eyed protagonist on a quest through an imagined world. ...

Big Hands Oh Big Hands, Let It Be Bigger and Bigger (2013)

This story takes place in a city, in which all of the citizens have very big hands. One child, however, is special. He has tiny hands, and his head full of peculiar thoughts. The boy constantly talks to people about these thoughts, but they dislike his lon ...

Recycled (2013)

An exhaustively created moving image mural of Beijing and her inhabitants, painstakingly extracted from an archive of half a million 35mm negatives. ...

My...MY... (2011)

A guy suddenly finds himself naked. Where are his clothes!? ...

Hu Lulu Hong Longlong Hua Lala (2010)

One day, a heavy rain floods a small, peaceful village. A brave child swims to the universe to save the day. ...

This Is Love (2010)

After a long flight, a young man is greeted lovingly by his girlfriend. As they embrace, the man spots a hole in the woman's sock. Can their love survive this? ...

Magic Cube and Ping-Pong (2009)

Love – and ping pong - can be liberating in a world of sameness. ...

The Universe Cotton (2009)

The story is a narration of a pseudoscience on cotton plantation. The protagonist waters the cotton with music and love, resulting in the greatest harvest that sky is the only way for the cotton to go. Landing from sky, the cotton turns from cloud into can ...

Pear or Alien (2008)

A happy planet of pear people is invaded by some mean reverse pear head aliens. A film about peace, tolerance and forgiveness. Drawn with pens on exercise books. ...

Monkey King Fight Lion Camel (2024)

As Tang Sanzang and his disciples arrive at Lion Camel Ridge, they encounter villagers captured by demons. Wukong's attempt to rescue them goes awry, and he and Zhu Bajie fall into a trap set by the three demon kings. Overwhelmed by their enemies, Wukong s ...

That Day, on the River (2023)

Searching for the house his father grew up in, director Lei Lei charts the story of a childhood in rural China using a mix of found footage, collage, and animation techniques: a moving account of all the things the father thinks he was not good at. ...

Lupita From Now On (2022)

What happened to Lupita after the frustrated attempt to get into the dance battle? And what's up with Huo now, the dancer that Lupita idolized? What remains of that life-changing afternoon in Lupita's best friend memory? ...

Recycled (2013)

An exhaustively created moving image mural of Beijing and her inhabitants, painstakingly extracted from an archive of half a million 35mm negatives. ...