LIU Ren refers to Charles Dickens’ famous saying in A Tale of Two Cities (1859)—“It was the best of times ⁄ it was the age of wisdom ⁄ it was the epoch of belief ⁄ it was the season of Light ⁄ it was the spring of hope ⁄ we had everything before us ⁄ we were all going direct to Heaven.” Having it recontextualised as the cover of Time magazine with the widespread slogan of China’s economic reform “Time is Money, Efficacy is life” as its caption, he employs the method of “superposition” to access the hermeneutic and critical dimensions of the flamboyant era in relation to the realities of the modern country.

刘任援引了查尔斯·狄更斯在⼩说《双城记》(1859年)中的著名段落——“这是最好的时代 ⁄ 这是智慧的时代 ⁄ 这是信仰的时期 ⁄ 这是光明的季节 ⁄ 这是希望之春 ⁄ 人们面前有着各样事物 ⁄ 人们正在直登 “天堂”。他将这些文字置于《时代》杂志的封面语境中，同时配合中国经济改⾰的口号“时间就是金钱，效率就是生命”作为标题。刘任借鉴“意象叠加”的方法，从诠释学和批判性的维度出发，抵达华丽时代下这个国家的底⾊。