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Ice Roof Tile

Wenbo Deng

synopsis

lenght

loop

year

2024

university

Birmingham City University, School of Architecture and design, United Kingdom / China

technical info

Video artwork

Ice Roof Tile is an artistic research intervention exploring repair as a temporary and unstable act. In response to the disappearance of traditional tiled rooftops and identity amid urban transformation, the artist repaired a damaged roof using tiles cast from ice. While roof tiles traditionally signify attachment and continuity, ice introduces inevitable melting and loss. This act of repair both sustains and destabilises the structure, revealing repair as a process rather than restoration. As the tiles dissolve, the work reflects on the fragility of urban space and questions how identity persists when familiar environments vanish.

Wenbo is an artist and researcher working between artistic practice and urban studies. Her work explores material culture, everyday practices, and the politics of visual identity in rapidly transforming cities, with a focus on Beijing. Through site interventions, she investigates how ordinary architectural element—clay roof tiles—mediate memory, belonging, and spatial change. Her research engages with themes of repair, temporality, and identity reconstruction, often combining artistic practice with critical theory. Her work reflects on how individuals negotiate shifting urban environments and how material forms participate in the ongoing production of cultural and political meaning.