Times passes by quickly and most of what we hear about China in the mainstream media is in regards to its economic development, so its easy to forget that:
TianAnMen Uprising was 1989
Cultural Revolution ended in 1976
Great Leap Forward ended in 1961
People's Republic of China was formed in 1949
Modern China, as we know it, has only been in existence for 60 years; less than a lifetime!! Walking around these old factories that used to build tanks, tires, pipes, guns, etc and seeing the art made by people who grew up during/after these tumultuous times is mind-blowing. The interplay between censorship, artistic freedom, rebellion, resentment, and celebration of the creativity of humanity makes the environment at 798 so potent that it has a strange hushed environment.
To say that there is a heavy influence of recent Chinese history on these artists would be an understatement. It leads one to wonder if they are angry or accepting of what has happened. At the end of the day, it just seems that this is the artist's way of coping with it. It might not have directly affected the artist or me, but it shaped our grandparents and it guided our parents. My mom stopped going to school for an entire year during the Cultural Revolution because it was too unsafe to leave the courtyard. My grandpa was jailed for speaking out against the burning of books and the destruction of ancient Chinese art. There's no escaping this type of burden. Its the price that the Chinese status quo has to pay. There were no avenues for this type of creativity until recently in China. It is beyond encouraging that now that China has opened to the West and has developed so fast economically, the floodgates for this type of artistic expression have opened fully.
Factory at 798. You can still see the red Maoist slogans painted on the factory walls/ceilings.
Walking around on the grounds of an honest-to-god factory.
The galleries are hidden in all sorts of basements and alleys.
I do like how they built around the factory rather than demolishing it. Here's the entrance to a gallery built around former steam turbines.
These steam pipes actually still work. The release valve at the bottom center of the pic is still shooting off pressure.
Here's a list of some of the galleries. The district is about 3 times the size of Chelsea in NY.
There is a solid theme of red in a lot of modern chinese art. Interpret these works as you will.
The slogan in the child's painting behind me says "hao hao xue xi, tian tian xiang shang," which basically means....study well and you'll keep rising. My dad's favorite slogan. If I had a penny for everytime I heard this, I wouldn't have to go get my JD.MBA.
There's also a new movement (?) in Chinese art where the people in the paintings are all the same person....either to reflect the political uniformity imposed by the CCP or that there are so many people in China that it is hard to distinguish or that the CCP sees everyone as the same and doesn't care if one person is left behind
This is one corner of a HUGE exhibit on the great leap forward. Even though this doesn't say anything anti-CCP, I'm still surprised that the government allows for such things. Hold on....what am I saying? I'm approaching the CCP from what the NYT & Western media tries to shove down my throat....oh geez....Where do I even start? Its NOT that oppressive here in China, yet at the same time, the CCP is always there. If I google Tiananmen, I see pictures from the night of the uprising. If I google Great Leap Forward, I can access the article on Wiki which says that the Chinese government made a mistake. Like Lisa, my managing editor at the Beijinger said, it all depends on how you express it. You can't put a big poster up that says "the CCP was DEAD wrong by ordering people to give up farming to create small-industry and thus starving thousands of people to death" but you can have an exhibit which shows half-built bridges, random metal beams scattered around, and a few bushels of wheat next to red flags. Just read between the lines. I mean...just look at my blog. Its still going past this "Great Firewall" isn't it? Man, if I get blocked, I'm going to be so pissed.
We stared at this exhibit for a long time. It was a series of photos of this little girl in adult clothes/weird positions. We couldn't figure out if it were just plain wrong or a way of exposing just how horrible child prostitution is or an expression that kids are growing up too fast these days.
This painting is awesome!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Its Chairman Mao swimming in this man's head. Towards the end of his life, many people spread rumors that Mao was dying. To prove them wrong, he swam like 10 miles, upstream, in the cold river....it was spread around China so quickly as CCP propaganda. Here he is...swimming in this man's head...where the brains/individual thinking should be.
Very apocalyptic. Airliners flying out on side, atom bomb going off in the bank, TianAnMen in the middle (Gate of Heavenly Peace is its Chinese Name), and this garden of paradise before it.
This woman/artist used to be a prostitute, and she was able to leave that profession once she started selling her art. In every picture of her gallery, she is naked but she is holding the remote control for the camera shutter. Therefore, even though she is naked and surrounded by men who used to use her, she controls when the photo is taken/when the moment is created. This was one of my favorite photos at 798.
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