The Happiness Restaurant
Joey Zhang
STUDENT ARTWORK
Category
Animation
Artwork medium
Maya
ARTIST STATEMENT
This satirical short is set in a restaurant where the posted rule 鈥渟mile or pay $30鈥 turns service into compliance. Drawing on Charlie Chaplin鈥檚 Modern Times, it聽sets聽a cheerful diner interior against a worker鈥檚 strained obedience, exposing the commodification of emotion in service聽labour聽and the quiet violence of mandatory happiness. The film challenges exploitative systems, showing how rules become absurd聽when they聽police expression. The music repeats the words 鈥渘ew day鈥 to underscore the irony that renewal never聽comes when time is owned by policy.
ARTIST INTRODUCTION
I鈥檓聽a 3D animator, sound designer and video editor based in Australia.
CONTACT
Email: hanwenzoe@gmail.com
Acknowledgement of Country
91色情片 School of Art & Design stands on an important place of learning and exchange first occupied by the Bidjigal and Gadigal peoples.
We acknowledge the Bidjigal and Gadigal peoples as the Traditional Custodians of the land that our students and staff share, create and operate on. We pay our respects to Elders past and present and extend this respect to all First Nations peoples across Australia. Sovereignty has never been ceded.
