Cao Fei’s documentary film, '11.11', depicts the landscape of production and consumption within China. Taking as its case study the overload of labour within the country’s largest retailer, JD.com, before and after the country’s Double Eleven Shopping Day (the equivalent of Black Friday), '11.11' travels from the manufacturer’s gigantic sorting centre to the many different delivery points spread across the city of Beijing and the couriers who move throughout this network.

A contemporary portrait of accelerated consumption driven by the powerful economy of online shopping within China, '11.11' questions the sustainability of rampant consumerism and how it is shaping our future social and economic ecosystems.

'11.11' is a documentary film that accompanies Cao Fei’s 2018 film, 'Asia One', a fictional narrative that follows the interactions of a young female worker, a male worker and an artificially intelligent robot in a large automated logistics centre called ‘Asia One Unmanned Warehouse’ in 2021.

Cao Fei, '11.11', 2018

Commissioned by the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York for The Robert H. N. Ho Family Foundation Chinese Initiative

Courtesy the artist, Vitamin Creative Space and Sprüth Magers