Project Overview
This project is sourced from the historical archives of Tsingtao Beer in China. It aims to explore the process of constructing modern Chinese nationalism by retracing the localisation process of beer, a foreign product.
Since 1903, Tsingtao Beer has gone through four historical periods: German and Japanese colonisation, the Nationalist government, and the establishment of the People’s Republic of China. It transformed from a “foreign product” to a “national product”, moving from upscale Western restaurants to the streets of common neighbourhoods. It can be said that Tsingtao Beer has witnessed the history of China’s modernisation process and has simultaneously promoted the formation of Qingdao’s regional culture. Today, in the tide of the market economy, beer has gradually become an emotional anchor for the people of Qingdao. It shares the same name as Qingdao, and the memories of its era are deeply imprinted in the hearts of the older generation.
Therefore, I reconfigured the historical archives and images and integrated interviews with the older generation’s oral history, hoping to present individuals’ reminiscences and melancholy about the historical process.