A live multi-media event coming to the Lone Fir Cemetery in October 2024

“Serenading the Departed” created and led by acclaimed artist Horatio Law will reconnect Block 14 in SE Portland to Old-Town/Chinatown to commemorate the Double Ninth Festival during October 11 and 12, 2024. In Chinese culture, the Double Ninth Festival is a holiday devoted to remembering and honoring the deceased, people sweep and decorate gravesites, burn incense, and make offerings.

Performances by Chinese musicians, opera singers, and youth storytellers at the Portland Chinatown Museum Teahouse will be live-streamed to audiences watching on a large scrim at Block 14 in Lone Fir Cemetery in SE Portland.  The produced youth storyteller videos and the livestreams of performances will honor the deceased and connect us with the history of early Chinese immigrants in Portland and the segregation they faced in their burial at Block 14. 

The performances simulate what the Chinese community would have enjoyed for pastime: tea drinking, musical performance, and storytelling. After the initial two-night event, the public can see the performances in AR on their mobile device via the Trace mobile app. Using art, music, and technology, we hope to create a virtual bridge to connect Chinese/Asian Americans and the public to this history behind Block 14, Lone Fir Cemetery, and to Chinatown/Old-Town.

MediaRites is partnering with Horatio Law on this project funded by a Metro Placemaking grant. We just completed filming of Chinese American youth storytellers who interviewed their family and elders to collect family immigration stories and also reflect on the meaning of the history of Block 14. 

Funded in partnership with MediaRites by Metro Placemaking. Additional support to Horatio Law by the Oregon Arts Commission, the Ford Family Foundation, the Regional Arts & Culture Council, the Portland Chinatown Museum, and the Stone & DeQuire Contemporary Art Award from the Sam Fox School at Washington University.