Mao's paintings in Cultural Revolution and contemporary Chinese Art - Term Paper Example

? Comparison of Mao’s Paintings in Cultural Revolution with Contemporary Chinese Art and Evaluation of Political Implication behind It Thesis ment The contemporary Chinese history is the consequence of a long drawn and wealthy cultural history of China. It deserves a worthy mention of the fact that contemporary Chinese art reflects the hues of contemporary Chinese history which is an amalgamation of the culture and art of its predecessors. Chinese art has been subjected to transition and transformation almost in every period. Twentieth century in China witnessed changes in art, culture and history at a more rapid pace than any other period in the history of China did witness. And, the paintings of Mao Zedong became a powerful emblem that captivated the gradual transformations in the cultural domain of China most pertinently. This essay shall focus on the paintings of Mao Zedong during the Cultural Revolution of China and upon the matrix of the paintings by Zedong; a comparative study of the contemporary Chinese art shall enable to comprehend the different political messages inherent in the paintings evolving in different periods of Chinese history and cultural history. Introduction In order to compare the paintings of Mao during the Cultural Revolution in China with that of contemporary Chinese art, it is quintessential to understand the fact at the outset of the essay itself regarding the sources of the images of Mao Zedong in the Chinese art. If the span of leadership and influence of Mao Zedong is introspected from a close contour, it culminates into an inference that Zedong has reigned in the Chinese political regime for in excess of a half century. This tenure is quite elaborate in nature; as a result the Chinese culture and art also underwent massive changes within the stipulated time frame. Not only did Chinese culture and society experience a massive change but also the Chinese art was not spared from the transformation the society was experiencing. In a very unprecedented manner, Chinese art experienced reforms that were related largely with its ideologies and presentations. Captivating the imprints of the revolutionary era, Chinese art evolved as one of the most celebrated and important facets of history of art in the world. Mao was dead but his physical death did not cease his eventual influence upon the people of China. Yan Shanchun correctly remarks in the essay, “The Image of Mao Zedong and Contemporary Chinese Art”, “Maoist’s thoughts on literature and art, and indeed his image, were the imperative factors in Chinese art movements in the entire later half of the twentieth century” (Jiehong, 2007). It has been very rightly observed that most of the portraits of Mao Zedong have been sketched from the photographs of the great leader. The photographs of Mao since the initiation of the art of photography during the middle of the nineteenth century influenced the portraiture of Zedong. With the growing years, the influence of the soviet communist leaders on the cultural domain of China started gaining grounds. If the China’s political ideology is revised then it can be well observed that during the late 1950s the ideological foundation of China’s political philosophy found its base from the two elements; Marxism–Leninism evolved as a pure theory and the thought process of Mao Zedong acted as a practical ideology, a thought that was executed. And, in the similar fashion, the communist leaders were being worshipped in the houses and streets of Russia, the portrait of Mao Zedong started appearing in the walls, stations and important crossing across the country enabling a rage of personal cult worshipping in China (Chineseposters.net, 2013). Comparison While executing the introspection of the paintings of the great leader Mao Zedong during the years of Cultural Revolution and after the siege of the revolution which falls under the era of the contemporary Chinese art, a great variety in the size, transformation regarding the strategies of painting propagandas, and compositions of the paintings of Mao Zedong can be observed. In a very subtle way, the ideological change in the political thought process over the years thus gets reflected through the change in the texture, size and compositions of the paintings in the different era. The first notable change in the paintings of Mao Zedong during the period of Cultural Revolution and after the end of the Cultural Revolution is the size of the portraits. Definitely, the sizes of the portraits captivate different political and ideological propagandas which eventually changed after the cease of Cultural Revolution in China. The Chinese art under the influence of the Cultural Revolution did project a state of utopia. The images were more fanciful and posited far away from the hard-core reality of the pragmatic world. Mao’s portrait was also not spared from this halo and hue. Painter Wang Qizhi who claims his knowledge of Mao’s facial expression more than his own face has dedicated almost twenty seven years of his career behind the portraits of Zedong. Wang recalls from his memory that Mao’s first portrait was erected in the year 1949. In this portrait, Mao was shown wearing a uniform and a military hat. Moreover, the very next year Zedong appeared without hat but he was still displayed wearing his Zhong Shan jacket and this time he was looking up slightly. This was done to break the image of Zedong as an army leader. Wang along with the artists Zhang Zhensi and Jin Shi are regarded as the third generation of Mao painters. These three painters collaborated and produced a painting of the leader in 1951 providing a stark human touch to the expression of the portrait. And, this painting sustained with the same style for more than fifty years where Zedong has been portrayed as an icon larger than life having the qualities of solemnity, icon of the people more amiable as a mass leader. During Cultural Revolution, Mao’s portrait was placed in the centre and it had a God like quality, thereby emitting yellow hallo like circles and having yellow background quite juxtaposed to the red color of rising sun. During the phase of 1958, Zedong himself complained regarding his height whenever he has appeared in any painting with the soviet communist Stalin. He asserted that his height if not taller than Stalin physically is definitely mightier in the realm of political domain than him. This led to the production of Mao’s images appearing taller in heights than the images of Marx, Engels, Lenin and Stalin. The height of the portraits not only depicted supremacy of Mao in the heart of the Chinese people who were likely compelled to look upwards to see the face of their great leader as one seeks the face of God looking upwards in the sky, but it also tried to deny the fact that Chinese communist regime was succumbing to Soviet communism at all (Ministry of Culture, P.R.China., 2011). Contrarily, a serious change in the propaganda strategies while framing the portraits of Mao Zedong after the culmination of the Cultural Revolution was noticed in the presentation of the portraits. It became evident that there were no customized compulsion from the authorities to deliver the portraits with pertinent agendas and the artists gradually received their space for generating independent practice of artistry and ideology through the portraits of Zedong. After the end of the Cultural Revolution, artists started drawing the portraits of Zedong largely from his photographs taken during mid-nineteenth century. The upsurge of the young artists groups since 1985 has been coined and looked upon by many scholars as the Contemporary Chinese art movement. The group of young artist started showing a style that was “dignified apathetic and solemn”. Various styles of expressionism and shades of personal feelings and styles were fabricated within the portrait of Zedong and it can be argued quite assertively that the portrait of Mao Zedong became more lively without any God like quality asserted upon him and free from any agenda of expressions and style, Zedong’s portrait in Contemporary Chinese art became an icon of cultural identity rather than being motivated solely politically (Jiehong, 2007). When the portrait of Wang Zhaoda entitled, ‘Mao Zedong ‘s Thoughts are the Pinnacle of Contemporary Marxism and Leninism” a color on paper in the year 1968 is given a close introspection it can be easily inferred that size reflected political superiority and during the Cultural Revolution of China, the size of the portraits did reflect the political superiority of the particular moment in history. The art was highly inspired by the soviet art and its inclusion of Soviet Socialist realism into the Chinese art pondered on an innovative and novel treatment of space in the oil paintings which were more representational with minimum space left for concepts. The extreme political agendas and ideologies compelled the artists to maintain a legacy during the Cultural Revolution, where they had to readjust the portrait and its size owing to the revolutionary zeal and fervor of people at that time. Contrarily, the contemporary Chinese art did portray the portrait of Mao Zedong on oil canvas and displayed a volley of thematic paintings but unlike its huge sizes, almost God like figurative implications of Cultural Revolution era, the contemporary art showed a normal visual perception of the figure in all the thematic paintings as can be envisioned in the oil on canvas portrait of Mao Zedong in the year 1990 by Yu Youhan and ZhaoShoub (Youhan, 1993; Art Speak China, 2012). The Cultural Revolution of China wanted to portray a more humane face of Mao Zedong. In such intention, they started portraying the man into a canvas of larger than life image which was almost a forced and compelled directive on artists who had to succumb to the whim and fancy of the party line and authorities. With the end of Cultural Revolution and emergence of Contemporary Chinese art, more and more space for creativity evolved, which can be well reflected on the painting of Yu Youhan entitled, “Mao he tade renmin” meaning “Mao and his People” which appeared on oil canvas of 182 x127cm in the year 1995. This indicated a huge portrayal of the figure but did not make it larger than life giving it a phenomenal appearance which became soothing and literally could relate with the mass and its thought process. Cultural Revolution did portray the figure of Mao using the methodology of oil painting on canvas, but very contrarily the motif of composition was different exhibiting the intended political philosophy and ideologies inherent at that period. The issues of ‘Left’ or ‘Right’ of Mao’s profile did strongly exhibit a transformation of cultural activities in the history of Chinese art. The more is implied through Mao’s appearance in the commemoration badges. The commemorative badges have the picture of Mao mostly on the left side. This phenomenon bears a striking deviation from the work of Chaowen’s work in the year 1950. This work is generally accepted as the typical and standard relief of Mao’s image. Since the ancient memorabilia from Egypt, Rome or Greece there is no intention of the specific orientation owing to the appearance of the figures on any side. However, during the political fervor of Maoist regime and Cultural Revolution in China, the appearance of the image on the left hand side did not intend the convenience for the execution of the work by the right-hand artists. Nevertheless, contrarily the left-oriented Mao appeared to intend the standardization of all the visual productions with a pertinent motif indicating his support to the leftist regime during campaigning executed politically (John McDonald, 2012). Conclusion The cultural history of China is varied. It cannot be neglected that politically the Chinese culture, art and history were largely influenced. The art of China might have undergone many transformations on the areas of its method of execution, materials, presentation and concepts. However, the heritage and legacy of Chinese culture remained intact and were manifested through active exercise of art and artistic inhibitions in all the periods equally. Mao Zedong appeared before the people of China as a great leader. Despite his economic and political failure at places he is still considered as one of the greatest leaders of China across the world. At times, compelled and at times spontaneous, the paintings of Mao did reflect the turmoil, transition and transformation of socio-cultural and socio-political changes faced by Chinese culture which definitely found its profound expression through Chinese art. References Art Speak China. (2012). Political pop. Retrieved from http://www.artspeakchina.org/mediawiki/Political_Pop_%E6%94%BF%E6%B2%BB%E6%B3%A2%E8%B0%B1 Chineseposters.net. (2013). Ideological foundations. Retrieved from http://chineseposters.net/themes/ideological-foundations.php Jiehong, J. (2007). Burden or legacy: from the Chinese Cultural Revolution to contemporary art. Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press. John McDonald. (2012). Go figure! contemporary Chinese portraiture. Retrieved from http://johnmcdonald.net.au/2012/go-figure-contemporary-chinese-portraiture/ Ministry of Culture, P.R.China. (2011). Wang Qizhi: the man who painted Mao. Retrieved from http://www.chinaculture.org/focus/focus/2011cpc90th/2011-06/27/content_418091.htm Youhan, Y. (1993). Shanghai. Retrieved from http://www.shanghartgallery.com/texts/yyh1.htm Bibliography Cushing, L., & Tompkins, A. (2007). Chinese posters: art from the great proletarian cultural revolution. San Francisco: Chronicle Books. Evans, H., & Donald, S. (1999). Picturing power in the People's Republic of China: posters of the Cultural Revolution. Lanham, Md: Rowman & Littlefield. Mao, T. (1960). Mao Tse-tung on art and literature. Peking: Foreign Languages Press. Read More