Yu Guangyi (Chinese: 于广义), born in 1961 in Heilongjiang Province, studied at the Chinese Academy of Art in Hangzhou, before working for several years as a woodcut print artist. In 2004 he returned to his home village and made the film Mu Bang (Timber Gang or The Last Lumberjacks) that in 2007 won the Best Director Prize and the Jury Prize at the Seoul Film Festival. A year later his second documentary Xiao li zi (The Survival Song) explored the rapid industrialization of a village, focusing on one of its inhabitants, a former forest gamekeeper named Han who illegally hunts bears to keep his family going. The film won two awards at Seoul and the Jury Prize at Tokyo Filmex. Yu Guangyi’s films give center stage those who have been left behind in the rush for progress in a country where the divide between rich and poor grows deeper every day.
