What are we becoming, us and our memory, when our « places », which are spaces significantly invested by social, cultural and spiritual practices, are being converted into « non-places », into « spaces which cannot be defined as relational, or historical, or concerned with identity » (Augé) ? This question underlies the fictional work of Still Life (Jia Zhangke, 2006), a movie about the dismantling, the ruining of the ancient city of Fengje due to the construction of the Three Gorges Dam. By becoming ruins, the material and symbolic substance from which the inhabitants can create their personal and collective memories is being « veiled »,is being made unreadable. The purpose of this article is to analyse how the cinematographic still lifes invented by Jia, since they critically mediate it, revive this substance, make it readable again, and, consequently, allow the creation of diverse memories.
