8.75mm film - a celluloid format unique to China and never circulated elsewhere, was a film format where no camera was made for. This print film stock was primarily used for mobile projection units to exhibit films in countryside, mountains, islands and ethnic minority regions in China from the 60s to 80s.

'What is a film without a camera?’, a question that emerged from the research, was explored by the artist through DIY printing and different photochemical processes. Images of film strips burn, blur, and tear within the chromatic space, the fleeting frames of archival films overlap with the super 8 camera footage shot by the artist. These interlayered images coalesce with optical sound and narratives from unnamed interlocutors, weaving together fragmented stories of an audience, a film factory and a camera inventor, where facts are immaterial, and memories are evanescent. 

Within the abstractions, the images and sounds of resistance are folded into the tales of the cinematic invention. Reimagining a format that once resisted circulation, as a medium through which other forms of affect and dissenting hearsay continue to ripple.
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Peng Zuqiang (b.1992, Changsha) works with film, video and installations. He is interested in the stories of media and mediums—from obsolete film formats to downtempo in Mandopop—attending to their affective resonances and dissenting associations. 

Recent solo presentations include Rockbund Art Museum (2025) , The Common Guild (2025), Fondazione Sandretto (2023), Kevin Space (2023), Cell Project Space (2022), E-Flux screening room (2022). Group exhibitions and screenings include videobrasil, UCCA Beijing, Schirn Kunsthalle Frankfurt, Times Museum, Eye Film Museum, The Physics Room, IFFR,IDFA, 25FPS, Alchemy Film and Moving Image Festival. He is a recipient of the Present Future prize at Artissima (2022), and the Dialog Award at EMAF (2023, 2024). He was a resident at Rijksakademie van Beeldende Kunsten (2022-2024).