Since 2005, Cheng Ran has been producing film and video works that draw widely from Western and Chinese literature, poetry, cinema, and visual culture, fabricating new narratives that combine myths and historical events. Cheng’s earliest works, shot entirely in the confines of his apartment, attempted to make the ordinary aspects of his immediate environment into compelling subject matter for his films. Inspired by filmmakers such as Werner Herzog, Jim Jarmusch, and Béla Tarr, Cheng’s subsequent films and videos often registered his curiosity as he observed the overlooked and incongruous aspects of everyday life and chronicled his interactions with remote and historic sites.