01 / FEATURE DOCUMENTARY

Goodbye, Yiwu (wt)

再见，义乌

Two girls hold hands as they walk through a market aisle lined with artificial greenery.

Directed by Elena Lecun Xiang

Feature-Length Documentary

U.S./China Production

Logline:

After 18 years apart from her mother, Lecun returns to Yiwu, her childhood wonderland and the world’s largest market, to capture a panorama of women’s lives behind global trade. As she uncovers the hidden sacrifices of motherhood, she must also confront the truth behind her own left-behind childhood.

Supported By:

  • 2026 CNEX Chinese Doc Forum 17 | IFG 6
    Winner of AIDC Award and IFG Best Potential on Impact Making First Prize
  • 2026 FIRST International Film Festival Documentary Lab
    西宁FIRST青年电影节 纪录片实验室
  • 2026 A-Doc Allies Program
  • 2026 Fusion Film Festival Docs in the Works
    Winner of Best Pitch Award

Stills:

A customer and shopkeepers among shelves of household goods in Yiwu.A merchant sits among pink boxes of dolls in a wholesale toy stall.A woman holds a child beside another woman at a market stall.Red gantry cranes rise above stacked shipping containers at a port.

Director:

Portrait of Elena Lecun Xiang in a blue dress, leaning on a stone wall.

Elena Lecun Xiang is a documentary filmmaker/editor based in New York City. Her work offers sensitive, emotionally resonant explorations of topics such as gender and immigration.

Her debut short, The Acupuncturist (2025), published by amNewYork, follows a Chinese acupuncturist advocating for immigrant healthcare and insurance reform in New York. Her feature in development, Goodbye, Yiwu (working title) has won the AIDC Award and IFG Best Potential on Impact Making First Prize at the 2026 CNEX Chinese Doc Forum, and Best Pitch at the 2026 Fusion Film Festival. It was also selected for the 2026 FIRST Documentary Lab and A-Doc Allies Program.

A graduate of NYU’s News & Documentary program, Elena has received recognition and support from the Video Consortium × Sony University Initiative Camera Contest, Asian American Journalism Association’s Jeannie Park Grant, and various grants from New York University.

Press: