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Summer 2018, British Magazine Trebuchet
China’s contemporary cultural revolution
——Voicing the tensions of a democratised culture
Words: Michael Eden
Images:
P. 151: Qu Leilei, Friendship (2012) Ashmolean.
P. 152: Chunwoo Nam, Chimerica. Images courtesy of the Artist
P. 155: Chunwoo Nam, Individual Space II (2007) Images courtesy of Artist
P. 156: Chunwoo Nam, Individual Story IV - I am here (2009).
P. 158: Chunwoo Nam sharing skills in New Work 2017. Photo courtesy of artist. © Robert Blackburn Printmaking Workshop
P. 162: Qu Leilei, Balance (2012). image courtesy of the Ashmolean.
P. 165: Qu Leilei, Blade of light (1998). image courtesy of the artist.
P. 168: Qu Leilei, Autumn (2016). image courtesy of the Ashmolean.
P. 170: (Above) Ai Weiwei, image courtesy of artist (Left) Zhu Wei, China China (2017) Courtesy of KH Gallery
P. 173: Zhu Wei in his studio. Image courtesy of the KH Gallery.
P. 175: Zhu Wei, Ink and Wash Research Lectures series (2012). Image courtesy of KH Gallery.
P. 177: Chunwoo Nam, Individual Story I (2007) Image courtesy of the artist
The rest of the world may have to seriously consider how the rise in Chinese power will affect our lives. Western hegemony is waning, and its stewardship of world culture is a mixed bag: freedom and equality are stained with slavery and exploitation; democracy and free votes are mixed with apathy and corruption. This is not to say that any other nation or state would do better, or that other epochs have been all light and purity, but the West may struggle to convince the peoples of the world of its values and, by extension, the rationale for keeping its place as the globe’s defining culture. Western culture needs to live up to its own ideals. Part of that will mean convincing the world that these ideals are worthwhile now the era of force is over. The values of individual freedom, free speech and free access to information are key in the development of an educated people with agency; moreover they are inventive drivers within a flourishing civil society. But how certain are we that they are the natural results of technological progress?
China is gathering momentum as an unstoppable force in the modern world, growing its economic and soft-power influence while simultaneously maintaining the largest army on the planet. If we consider freedom of speech and access to information as central to our lives, thinking of the internet, we may well wonder whether China’s example will prove to be the template for our future rather than our industrial past. The winners and losers as a result of China’s paradoxical technological boom are evident in cities containing multiplying millionaires adjacent to blinking trinket factories where workers, under pressure, resort to suicide. Perhaps within the nuances of these changes the biggest winners are the Communistic Party of China (CPC), a multi-armed regulatory body whose grip on the lives of over a billion individuals has not been weakened by the competing pull of that great Western kraken, the World Wide Web.
Amongst the tectonic cultural forces shifting and grinding for global ascendance are creative voices who through elegant works of art are resisting the central spread of homogeneity that is new China by offering difference and choice within the social templates of what a future human might be.
...RESISTING THE CENTRAL SPREAD OF HOMOGENEITY THAT IS NEW CHINA.
History of alternative perspectives in China: Stars Group.
During his lifetime Mao Zedong set out an attitude to art outlawing anything that didn’t appeal to the masses and support the official doctrine of the one-party state. Self-expression in art was prohibited. This kind of control is not aimed at artists in particular, but at any dissemination of information which might create new perspectives and therefore weaken state control over the outlook and sympathies of the people. In the digital age contemporary
Chinese authorities are trying to control the electronic flow of information by blocking swathes of the internet, mirroring Mao’s concerns. The tacit understanding here is that Chinese society is not a homogeneous unit; within the commonalities there are crucial differences that are dangerous enough to necessitate enforced silence.
Infamous for his use of the internet, artist Ai Weiwei is possibly the most obvious combination of both disruptive forces: art and online activity. Ai’s father, a poet, was condemned as a rightist under Mao’s rules, his life turned upside down and the family sent to labour camps. Artists also fell into this category, individuals who dealt in creativity and alternatives, and who might undermine propaganda or rally people to a cause. The Stars Group emerged out of this background. Beginning in 1979 they fought hard for recognition after being denied a space to show their work, making enemies of local and national officials along the way:
Stars responded by organizing a protest march in the name of individual human rights. Starting out from the Xidan Democracy Wall, the demonstrators made their way to the headquarters of the Peking Municipal Party Committee under the banner ‘We Demand Democracy and Artistic Freedom’. Finally, from 23 November to 2 December 1979, the First Stars Exhibition was held in the Huafang Studio in Beihei Park, Beijing. - Zee Stone Gallery
Operating in Beijing until 1983, the group consisted of many artists who would subsequently make their name abroad: Ma Desheng, Huang Rui, Yan Li, Yang Yiping, Wang Keping, Qu Leilei, Mao Lizi, Bo Yun, Zhong Ahcheng, Shao Fei, Li Shuang and Ai Weiwei. In 1983, under increasing pressure from officials, the group disbanded and the leading protagonists left China for global recognition as part of a vibrant creative diaspora:
Speaking from the history of Chinese art, Star painting will indeed be an incident. Many say: Oh, a bunch of young people are still childish. The work is immature, indeed admitted, but as a phenomenon and an event, it plays a very important role in the history of the development of Chinese art. - Qu Leilei, ‘Every single star shines independently’, news.99ys.com
Known as the June Fourth Incident, the 1989 Tiananmen Square protests are the most famous suppression of democratic activism in China. The protests were studentled and, broadly speaking, demanded greater say in decisions, more freedoms and rights. If the authorities might have flirted with compromise in the past but this quickly evaporated and martial law was declared, partly due to the spread of protests around the country. Armed troops shot between 180 and 10,454 citizens – the discrepancy in these numbers alone is testament to the deep divisions that still exist within a society not ready to bear the realities of an open investigation.
Both Tiananmen Square and Stars Group are subject to restricted internet searches in China, which means some or all relevant information is redacted. In the case of Tiananmen Square, no mention of the protests is visible when searched for in Chinese.
Netizens in China
...DROVES OF TECHNOCRATS ARE EMPLOYED TO SPY...
The internet can be seen as an exaggeration of this kind of relationship. It offers people alternative sources and the means to organise and publish information. In this sense it is often thought of as having naturally democratic features, and is also connected to self-expression and personal freedom. The internet’s arrival in China in 1994 (after some brief activity in the late 1980s) was met with suspicion by the authorities. At that time their experiences with artists and students had primed them to spring promptly into action to set up their defences and implement restrictions to internet use. Today, a quarter of the world’s internet users reside in China, subject to the aforementioned restrictions1, and e-commerce is increasingly relevant in stabilising the economy.
Golden Shield and the Great Firewall
By 1997 the Chinese government was taking serious measures to block and control the internet. These combined laws and technologies such as the Great Firewall include methods such as IP blocking, DNS filtering and redirection and SSL attacks.
Fostering the sense of being listened to or watched is extremely effective and leads to what is called ‘chilled speech’2, whereby people’s fear of punishment inhibits their free communication. The Great Firewall has allowed China to effectively develop its own easy-to-influence versions of websites, such as Tencent, Alibaba and Baidu. There are also versions of YouTube and Twitter. Finance companies like Zhima Credit assist the government in prosecutions and information gathering (which they claim is voluntary). Sometimes called Golden Shield, many government departments co-operate to share information about users, as well as blocking or controlling webpages. Successfully blocked sites include Facebook, Gmail, Google, YouTube and many more. Droves of technocrats are employed to spy on people and redirect them to progovernment sites and content.
New forms of control: technology
Mara Hvistendahl reports that in China many people are making financial transactions online, and that companies like Zhima Credit are engaging in social ranking and aiding the government with ever greater controls.
According to Xinhua, the state news agency, this union of big tech and big government has helped courts punish more than 1.21 million defaulters, who opened their Zhima Credit one day to find their scores plunging. The State Council has signaled that under the national social credit system people will be penalized for the crime of spreading online rumors, among other offenses, and that those deemed ‘seriously untrustworthy’ can expect to receive substandard services. – Mara Hvistendahl, ‘Inside China’s Vast New Experiment in Social Ranking’, Wired (December 2017)
This useful digital tool is also a handy way for the CPC to guide and influence their citizens, who are increasingly encouraged or required to shop, save and bank in this way.
Censoring the internet
China’s suppression of the supposed naturally democratic forces of the internet is a colossal task, and is understood to be model for those states who would like to carry out similarly high levels of control.
An article by Simon Denyer (with contributions from Xu Yau Jingjing), ‘China’s scary lesson to the world: Censoring the Internet works’3, was featured in the Washington Post in 2016, and many of their observations remain concrete almost two years later. The thrust of the article confirmed what many in the know were already aware of, and what has increasingly become a normal fact of life in China: that the authorities there have successfully developed and updated their strategies for controlling the internet in such a way that trade and what the authorities see as ‘benign’ use are not interrupted.
Of course the ‘normalisation’ here is simply another ‘truth’ in our time of ‘alternative facts’ and ‘post-truth’ tendencies. Dong Lishen, senior researcher at the Hong Kong and Macau Affairs Office of the State Council, writing in the South China Morning Post represented the nuances and sophistication of this normalisation as far back as 2013, supporting the CPC’s censorship and security measures, and even asserting that the authorities ‘should’ or ‘must’ go further and do more to ensure ‘social harmony and lasting political stability’. This raises the frightening possibility that similar strategies might be behind the UK government’s current plan to straighten out the internet. More control is always tempting for those who must uphold the law. If China’s stance on internet access were to become ascendant over the West’s generally permissive attitude, who wouldn’t be affected?
China needs a diverse and multi-layered legal system for cyberspace. The National People’s Congress and the State Council should formulate administrative rules and regulations. Government departments should develop specific operational procedures and a sound legal system. This can help promote a stable and harmonious community in cyberspace. And, to keep abreast of changes in the online world, the relevant authorities should, from time to time, publish white papers or assessment reports to address in a timely fashion any social problems that arise, to ensure the sustained and healthy development of cyberspace. - Dong Lishen, ‘Why China needs new internet laws to fight the online rumour-mongers’, South China
Morning Post (20 September, 2013)
The tone is forceful but civil and measured throughout. Lishen states many times what the government ‘should’ do, and there is an abundance of terms such as ‘safeguard’, ‘social harmony’, and ‘stability’. The Machiavellian point is that the authorities are already doing these things, and Lishen’s prompts for action can be read as bolstering existing policy. Unless, of course, you read the article as a veiled entreaty for dissent through official media channels, the overtly propagandist tone of stability and harmony might be the result of a tongue planted firmly in a cheek. Such is the manner in which information is shared under an authoritarian regime.
DISSENTING VOICES END UP FINDING THEIR AUDIENCE IN THE WEST.
Even assuming its sincerity, however, Lishen’s article shows some Western bias and habit, opening with images referencing punishments doled out by the CPC to the Orwellian-termed ‘rumour-mongers’ who have got on the wrong side of the authorities due to their online activity. A Western reader would naturally expect this Image: :Chunwoo Nam sharing skills in Ney Work 2017. Photo courtesy of artist. © Robert Blackburn Printmaking Workshop kind of opening gambit to be followed by calls for greater freedom of speech and internet usage. However, regardless of Lishen’s actual intentions, to the general Chinese reader the article’s encouragement of prison sentences for ‘rumour-mongers’ highlights the very real moral and compelling topography of contemporary China.
China is a nation acutely aware of its history; from Confucius and ancestor worship to stories of the Long March, the cultural thrust of China is that the individual is officially subsumed into society. Bearing in mind that the lot of the average Chinese person has been on a upward trajectory for over thirty years, it is easy to see why propagandist writers like Lishen find an audience amongst those who wish the fast-moving boat to remain unrocked.
Moreover, the compact of a capitalised system is that it regenerates and reproduces consumers, the modern rhetoric of which is centred around individual needs and personal desires. Both of these ‘attitudes’ are flawed and require re-evaluation moving forward. Denyer describes China’s vision of ‘internet sovereignty’, which is a neat term for heavily censored and controlled use that still allows people and businesses to spend money. This is essential and makes the investment in both the Great Firewall and Golden Shield clearly necessary. China can’t just switch off the problem since, as Denyer writes, e-commerce in China accounts for forty per cent of the global total. For Lishen, the CPC has a duty to provide this ‘sovereignty’ for people, to ensure their safety and wellbeing. He sees the introduction and upholding of laws and restrictions as particularly vital.
While China is still adapting to this new world, internet use is expanding rapidly and an online community has emerged almost out of the blue. Figures show that at the end of 2011 there were more than 500 million internet users on the mainland and 250 million microbloggers. More than 38 per cent of the population had internet access. In this seemingly unfettered world, many people have gone beyond what is deemed acceptable in a traditional society, where law and order prevail. - Dong Lishen, ibid.
He goes on to correctly quote the many laws passed by the US to ensure that their version of ‘safe’ is upheld. It’s a subtle way of drawing attention to a feeling many countries have of the double standards inherent in US policy, and Western conscience in general. Lishen does not condemn any of these actions but does use them as evidence that China should develop its own approach. It’s worth noting that as more and more working-age Chinese people require job, the government needs e-commerce and digital technology to take pressure off the building industry, since its staggering consumption of concrete and building of ghost cities to propel the economy forward has a finite physical limit.
China needs the internet: the connections and money it offers provide upper-working class and middle-class Chinese people a living. Their ranks have swelled in recent years and they won’t be content to labour on building sites on the Mongolian border4. These people are increasingly international and if there is change to come it will more than likely be in response to the demands of China’s upwardly mobile middle class. Whether these people will care enough about their personal freedoms to risk displeasing the authorities is another matter. Next time you feel smugly rebellious because you have tweeted insults at Theresa May or lampooned Donald Trump in a witty Facebook update, consider that in China ‘rumour spreading’ on the internet carries a three-year prison sentence.
Defying the state
We might also recall Ai Weiwei’s very public use of the internet to voice his dissatisfaction at the regime. Weiwei is just such a problem, pulling out of his part in the 2008 Olympics (Ai was commissioned to design the Bird’s Nest Stadium) and protesting at the shoddy building work and government cover-up that, in Ai’s view, contributed significantly to the death toll of the tragic Sichuan earthquake. Weiwei’s Snake Ceiling and Remembering, shown in Japan and Germany, directly recalled and criticised that tragedy and ultimately led to his infamous disappearance, torture, heavy surveillance and finally banishment. Ai now lives in Germany and reports grimly that his mother tells him, when he calls for news: ‘Never come back,.’ It is clear why many dissenting voices end up finding their audience in the West. Weiwei and those like him are just the sort of people Lishen has in mind when he states:
We have to fight against misinformation and comments intended to incite social unrest and infringe on civil rights, in order to protect citizens’ right to express their opinions legally. This should be the main aim of internet legislation. - Dong Lishen, ibid.
Perhaps no one has done so much to trespass against such values as Ai Weiwei while still holding on to his life (albeit in a different country, and after being tortured).
Artists are by no means the only ones offering resistance to government controls. If that were the case, there would be little chance of any change at all. Artists can be useful, though, to channel ideas, and like perceptive canaries in a mine they can show us what’s not acceptable.
This gives us a clear image of what sort of information is prohibited and what kind of characters are finding themselves on the wrong side of the Chinese authorities.
Qu Leilei, ‘A Chinese Artist in Britain’
A contemporary of Ai Weiwei is Qu Leilei, an equally important artist who has made his home in Britain and who is currently showing work at the Ashmolean (until 15 April 2018). His show ‘Qu Leilei: A Chinese artist in Britain’ is a wonderful tour de force, showcasing his technical ability, experimentation and sensitivity. At first glance it’s hard to see why the work and the man are out of favour with the Chinese authorities, but we have to remember that Qu was previously a (founding) member of the controversial Stars Group, and so he was one of those guiding minds that defined the authorities’ cold attitude towards colourful upstart artists and their radical sympathies.
[W]hile some of the most successful modern Chinese artists, having achieved a popular style or subject-matter, keep on repeating themselves, Qu Leilei, when he has fully explored the possibilities of one form, or subject, moves on to explore another. - Professor Michael Sullivan
The same man whose gentle touch that blends Western and Eastern traditions so masterfully and produced the beautiful images above, owing much to impressionism and Matisse (hardly a call to arms), is also the rabble-rouser and figurehead pictured below marching against the government in 1979 (centre right with yellow placard).
Of course, there was always something radical about impressionism, which reacted against the gloomy and austere propaganda of the statefavoured neoclassicism by switching focus from gods and military heroes (getting the French public ready for violence) and exploring instead ordinary people, pastimes and places. This radicalism is harder to notice, but it’s an evident link to early modernism and can also be seen in the portrait series called ‘Everyone’s Life is Epic’.
WHICH REACTED AGAINST THE GLOOMY AND AUSTERE PROPAGANDA OF THE STATE. CHINESE MAGAZINES OMIT REFERENCE TO THESE . . . WORKS.
Qu is a canny tactician and has shown his work in China as well as in the West; his art can be seen both as a kind of ‘rite of survival’ for both humanity in inhumane times and as a call for
inclusive togetherness.
Surely the human hand is one of the most difficult things to draw; but not only does he draws hands beautifully; he makes of them a powerful image expressive of thoughts, feelings, humanity, and love. - Professor Michael Sullivan
This is most evident in Qu’s calmer works, and is a very clever way to generate sympathy for his ideas, like playing moving music over a scene in a film to heighten the emotional kick. Indeed, his close-ups of hands so lovingly portraying platonic bonds bring to mind filmic strategies for inducing catharsis and empathy. Even these works, though, have a hidden violence. The hands clasping one another are desperate and earnest. These are intense images, given extra impact and made cinematic by the grand scale. These motifs - hands, nudes and portraits - have been shown in Beijing. The messages are subtle enough not to attract too much unwanted attention or dredge up sore old grudges.
Danaë is also a wolf in sheep’s clothing, artistically speaking. The passive beauty lying in an almost foetal position on decorative fabric is non-threatening. Her pose and frame are typical of many nudes, absent in much traditional Chinese art, and Qu is here connecting himself to Western art history by tackling the subject.
We might glance at this, take pleasure in her form, and his skill in missing the mythological reference. Almost a veiled threat, Danaë was the wronged mother of Perseus who was shut up in a box with her child by a cruel and power-obsessed authority. She was cast adrift, only to be saved by the gods and raise a great hero who returned to defeat Medusa and the Kraken and who, in true Greek style, inadvertently destroyed the man who had so desperately tried to get rid of him and his mother. The symbolism of that discreet reference allows a more radical reading to take place.
Qu does almost make more direct work in terms of his unambiguous feelings toward the military and the political overtones in China. The ‘Empires’ series is more like Banksy in concept (if Banksy were a formidable draughtsman with a greater level of sensitivity and a really dangerous background against which to work).
These images are explicit and concern a highly controversial issue in China. They portray the rigidity of thinking required to ‘do your duty’ without question. The reference to the Terracotta army is as much about the literal inert matter as it is about being owned as rigid automaton in service, body and soul, to the empire personified as the emperor.
The work echoes concerns in China that the army, which is said to have more men than any other, should be reduced. The sense of history repeating is simultaneously; humorous, vicious and deeply felt for Chinese viewers. Consider the figure in The Soldier, a masculine product of the regime, already redundant in the wars which rage in economies, online and in the soft-power exchanges of aid and trade. Where is the place for these hundreds of thousands of young men? Shall they all be retrained as tech-savvy bureaucrats?
It’s unclear whether this work has been shown in China. Searches show only the less explicit work and the reviews in Chinese magazines omit reference to these more powerful works. Ironically, the variety of the work by this dissident artist allows for a selection to be made suited to the contrasting attitudes and tastes of both Chinese and Western official audiences. In each case, a culture chooses its own.
DENOUNCEMENT OF MANY TRADITIONAL LAYERS
Zhu Wei
Zhu Wei lives and works in Beijing, and his criticism of the regime is intermingled with sharp observations of the culture at large. Zhu is concerned with the break in historical development that the Chinese faced when Mao instigated the Cultural Revolution. This saw the denouncement of many traditional layers of Chinese culture, and included the destruction of art and historical relics, as well as the infamous burning of the Wanli Emperor (Ming Dynasty), whose remains were dug up by the extremist Red Guards, denounced and destroyed.
This kind of ‘purging’ has occurred in Russia and Nazi Germany, and has nothing to do with improving the lives of ordinary people, who are often goaded into destructive acts to preserve those in power. Zhu goes further than this and sees these fractures as damaging the ‘collective unconscious’. We see this kind of madness today in the mass destruction of pre-Islamic art in the Middle-East by extremist groups. At least part of Zhu’s practice is an attempt to re-establish the links between this once-forbidden past and the problematic present. From 8th of Feb to the 24th of march 2018 Zhu Wei is showing work, ‘Virtual Focus’, at the Kristin Hjellegjerde Gallery in London.
The Ink and Wash Research Lecture Series is a reflection on tradition. It uses the techniques of ink painting to examine the malaise of a contemporary society, a place in which the government and the individual exist perpetually at odds. These almost generic figures are the receivers of what he refers to as ‘stability maintenance’ – a government trying to create ever more compliant behaviour in its citizens in the bid for social unity. - Zhu Wei: ‘Virtual Focus’, Kristin Hjellegjerde Gallery, 2018
Regarding his experiences of being an artist in China, Trebuchet wondered whether Zhu Wei had experienced the ‘constraints’ of Chinese culture? And also whether, as an international figure, he saw any flaws in the ‘freedoms’ of the West?
Zhu Wei: Forty years ago, the Cultural Revolution in China eradicated the accumulation of our culture and civilisation thoroughly. This eradication does not have any positive meaning; instead, it made us backslide to the Middle Ages in the name of revolution and progress. This kind of retrogression could be catastrophic in any country in the world, even worse than the result of a war. People will be aware of the cruelty of a war, knowing that it’s destined to be a disaster, but the cultural disaster is collective unconscious, and the result of which is that it can happen again at any time, on a greater scale, because people have accumulated the experience for similar movement.
China is inheriting the reins of global power and is becoming ever more relevant in the world. Is that reflected in the attitudes and views of people in China?
It is a rare quality in China to learn from others humbly. After the ten-year baptism of the Cultural Revolution, people are accustomed to false, big and empty talk, and adults will be blushing and even uneasy for several days after telling the truth, as if they are telling a falsehood. In the 1980s, when China had just opened its door to the outside world, we had been modest for a while, but it didn’t take long before people started to think there was nothing good in the Western countries.
The reason is that we are still living in two different times and spaces. On the surface we are seemingly related to each other, but in fact we are on two parallel tracks. For example, before the Reform and Opening-up, political movement was the mainstream. Every Chinese attached importance to ideals and despised wealth. The poorer, the more fashionable, and women would love the poorest ones. At that time Chinese people thought the Western countries did not have ideals; they were too realistic, and too specific, which should be criticised.
In the 1980s, after the Reform and Opening-up, economic movement became the mainstream, the government advocated that the minority should get rich first, and then the entire society began the pursuit of wealth endlessly. People love the richest ones, and people love the rich Western countries. When the Chinese travelled abroad, they found that sometimes people in the Western countries are not so rich, and some even look poor; they ignored that most Westerners have religious beliefs, most Western countries have a balanced developed society, but started to think that the Western countries are too unrealistic, too ideal, so they are seemingly not worth learning from.
Many of your works portray dissatisfied and thoughtful soldiers/officers. Can you explain the middle-class tension in China around the size of the army and the cost of paying for so many soldiers, since the country is not involved in armed conflict?
This is actually common sense, but it is late for us to know it because there is no such education. When I was a soldier, I only knew that the food was too poor and the living conditions were too bad in all aspects. I thought that the government should allocate more money to the military, to improve its pay and conditions. I didn’t know that the military had so much money, or that the money from the government is paid by the taxpayers.
The curtain in your work has a dual meaning: this communist reference is undercut with a sense of hope as your use of the colour red is apparently auspicious in Chinese culture. That said, the curtains are often fragmentary and full of holes. Can you explain the tension between those concepts?
China has had little to do with red for thousands of years of her history. In some dynasties, emperors associated themselves with yellow, which represents the dignity and elegance of the royal family, such as the Qing dynasty. Red came from the West, representing communism and revolution and progress. For more than sixty years, until today, red has always been a symbol of the red regime. As an artist, recording accurately the characteristics of the society is an obligation and responsibility.
I became famous when I was twenty-six. It was a good feeling when I was young, but now I think it’s a burden because every step of your way you will be noticed by many people, and it will lead to cautiousness and fear of failure. I have given up on quite a few experiments, and some of them might have been really successful.
You have created an image of Marx that appears quite sensitive, employing traditional skill, but the feeling of this image and its companion image of Engels is unclear. The faces seem rubbed out or as if they are behind frosted glass. What are your feelings about Marx and his legacy?
Marx is one of the many European philosophers. He is well known in China for his theory and his book Das Kapital, and today Marxism-Leninism is still serving as the guiding ideology of this country and guidelines that all people should follow. I’m not a fan of this guy. His theory may be immature and at least in his own country it has been outdated and abandoned. Not following his social theory, Germany is a rich and respected country today. His legacy is an ordinary outdated empty talk, such as the discussion of ‘surplus value’.
Your images about dreaming are inspiring. This act of dreaming, relatively unobserved here in Britain (where dreaming is seen just as a side effect of sleep), is a form of transformation. It seems like the freedoms we have, say, access to information over the internet, are a distraction and do not really necessarily help us become better or more free and creative. Do you think that people in both cultures dream too small?
Your question expresses the difference between two civilisations, which is two different dreams. Today in China, even artists and cultural scholars are talking about money and how to make more money. The more you earn, the more successful you are. Freedom is specific here. For example, the more money you have, the more you feel free. You can do whatever you want to do. Of course, the premise is to be alive, and then you can eat, drink, travel, buy real estate, replace cars, replace wife. When 1. 4 billion people are pursuing the same game, you can imagine how cruel it is.
As an established painter, what motivates you to continue making art?
The difference between my work and other contemporary art from China is that it is done within a native painting style, a different painting style from the East. It does not synchronise with Western contemporary art, and it has its own characteristics and aesthetic way. My starting point for every creation is to make an innovation. My motivation is to record and leave some things and characteristics of this era.
Chunwoo Nam
In contrast to Zhu Wei, Chunwoo Nam’s digital prints have a slightly different tone. As a Korean- American, he uses his cultural plurality, a little distanced from both great powers, to see the negative and positive sides of both Eastern and Western forces, represented by China and America. He was awarded the Grand Prize from the Seoul International Print Biennial 2011 for his ‘We Are Here’ suite (below). He currently lives and works in the United States.
Nam’s series, recently renamed ‘Their Globalisation’, has been interpreted very differently both as a call for greater integration and as a celebration of blending and interdependence:
One-time cultural enemies locked in a dance of interdependence. Communists and Capitalists dancing around their former ideologies. Cultures becoming intertwined on the constant flow of goods and money. In this suite of prints the Korean artist Chunwoo Nam visualizes this dance of cultures and calls into question the ideologies that held these two cultures apart as enemies for so long. By combining their symbols of power (their flags) and place (Tiananmen
Square, Times Square), he creates a view of these cultures whose dance is shrinking our globe and also our cultural divide. Chunwoo seems to be telling us ‘Dance On!’ - Clay Street Press
What began as a statement of arrival and positivity, perhaps in line with the quote above, has more recently become disillusioned. The renaming hints at distance and alienation, exemplified by the addition of the striking digital print Chimerica Flag. The dancing figures are gone; behind the familiar Chinese stars is the fractured and persistent US dollar, strangely confined behind what now seem like vertical bars. Money and its circulation is the motor of ‘Their Globalisation’.
More recently Nam has explored the internet, in Individual Story VI. The work is more personal and melancholic, but the sensitivity and humanity of Nam’s intensions make his practice compelling:
[T]he mecca of popular culture is silenced, reminding us that social class and access to information, finances, and the internet are defining culture in a global economy. American culture, often focused on assimilation, can leave the cultural outsider isolated, as if in a remote field where the masses of people become blades of grass, slowly growing over, engulfing and burying the vestiges of culture that remain in this modern metropolis - Essye Klempner, EFA Center, New York
NEGATIVE AND POSITIVE SIDES OF BOTH EASTERN AND WESTERN FORCES
In China there are real obstacles and controls that prevent its netizens from accessing the truth. In America and the West this is largely not the case, but do we care about the truth? What do we do with this information? Do we simply turn away from it towards more palatable narratives? This question put me in mind of one of America’s most perceptive writers, Ray Bradbury:
The most important thing to know about
Fahrenheit 451 is that it is explicitly not about government censorship. (Bradbury was so firm on this point he once walked out of a UCLA class when his students tried to insist it was so.) The firemen aren’t burning books on the orders of some shadowy Big Brother. They’re doing it, protagonist Guy Montag is told, because society as a whole turned away from the scary cacophony of knowledge, from the terror of differing opinions and the burden of having to choose between them, from deep and troubling thoughts. - Chris Taylor, ‘Fahrenheit 451: Did Bradbury’s Dystopia Come True?’, mashable.com (6 June 2012)
LISHEN’S RATIONALISATION OF THE STATE’S INTERVENTIONS
Bradbury’s attitude was infamous, as it didn’t fit neatly into the liberal consensus (of the time) that an evil force prevented our great becoming. Rather, as Taylor observes, he felt that we often simply can’t be bothered with tough issues and turn away in favour of less testing themes. This, a dig at American popular culture, is a lesson that must not be forgotten when we criticize China’s attitude to freedom of information. Nam’s works appear to have moved in this direction, tellingly in the works which include his observations on his daughter’s assimilation (or lack thereof) to middle American culture.
The freedom we have can be complex and bittersweet, and it is by no means complete We can be confident, though, that we are better off on our journey to freedom than those in China, who risk being disappeared if they speak out too persistently. Alienation seems to be universal, common to both East and West. The Chinese authorities are keen to draw parallels between their interventions and the American government’s when it comes to individual freedom.
The Gift
Simon Denyer, quoting the expert Rogier Creemers, claims that Edward Snowdon’s revelations about America’s internet surveillance are ‘the gift that keeps on giving’, preventing the West from taking the moral high ground. China may be restrictive, but America is intrusive.
[A]s revealed by NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden, the US government has wantonly resorted to various means to monitor the e-mail and internet traffic of citizens, infringing on their basic rights, in an effort to protect national security. - Dong Lishen, ibid.
We can add here recent claims about Russian involvement in electionrigging in the US (largely taken to be internet-based manipulation). We might imagine the CPC mandarins, ever more reassured by their own strategies, secure in the knowledge that no such foreign interference would be possible within their borders. We might also consider Trump’s use of Twitter to be very bad PR for internet freedom among Chinese bureaucrats, especially when he goads North Korea and refers to mass destruction, making the Chinese president appear dignified by comparison.
China can learn from the US experience and never allow anyone or any institution to monitor or eavesdrop on ordinary citizens or infringe on their basic rights on the grounds of national security and social stability. - Dong Lishen, ibid.
It’s a point not missed by Lishen, who clearly explains the more palatable laws the US has, compared to China, but then swiftly reminds us that to really protect its people the US has to break those rules and violate those rights. Lishen’s rationalisation of the state’s interventions, and his sense of being ‘at ease’ with sanctions and punishments, is justified by a sound, if totalitarian, logic. This version of ‘normal’ battles for hegemony with what is ‘normal’ in a faltering West whose credibility is damaged.
Hopes for open horizons
There are two hopeful points to emerge from Lishen’s article reflected in the Chinese authorities’ attitudes and actions. Both are unintentional, and the first requires a clear reversal of his intention to shock the reader:
The rapid development and popularity of the internet has created new problems in the social landscape. Traditionally, people have been defined to a large extent by their professions, titles or class. Such ‘labels’ create boundaries and exert an unseen pressure on people to help them maintain self-discipline. - Dong Lishen, ibid.
WE MIGHT SEE THAT ANY DISORDER IS TRULY NASCENT
The breakdown of ‘classes’ and ‘types’, and the removal of limitations to communication that these caused, is seen as a horror to be controlled, and is applied here to convince us that a lack of conformity to certain types and classes is a lack of self-discipline tantamount to rebellion.
The strategies of the CPC are certainly aimed at reinforcing these categories and ensuring people remain very much in their box. Our optimism may come from simply seeing this breakdown and the further development of this as a positive, allowing people from different jobs, classes and economic areas to create new dialogues and demand new privileges.
The second hopeful point, ironically, makes me think of Mao and requires a little more subversion:
Everything under heaven is in utter chaos; the situation is excellent. - Mao Zedong
Of course, considering the Great Firewall, Golden Shield, the State Internet Information Office and the bureaucrats employed in various dystopian-sounding organisations to manage online activity, we might see that any disorder is truly nascent, an embryo at best, which could yet be stillborn.
Asking the Experts:
Reflection and Conclusions Reflecting on these pertinent issues, Trebuchet asked some experts about their opinions on the issues in this area.
Madeline Earp is the Asia research analyst for Freedom on the Net, Freedom House’s annual index of global internet freedom. Earp collaborates with local researchers to assess internet access, censorship and user rights in fifteen countries across East, South-east and South Asia, and authored the report’s China chapter in 2014 and 2013.
Zixue Tai is the author of ‘The Internet in China’ and numerous papers on the internet, technology and consumerism in China. Zixue is also associate professor in the School of Journalism and Media at the University of Kentucky.
Do you think, as some have said (Ai Weiwei, for example), that eventually the internet in China will inevitably wrest itself free of governmental control? Is there a real sense of dissent in China, or does the regime have the unwieldy internet under control?
Zixue Tai: Many people in the West have made similar arguments in that the internet has not changed anything in China, and it won’t do that any time soon. That is misleading and misses the larger issues. The internet has brought about a lot of change within the country already, and will continue to do so down the road. Online tirade, protest and petition can be found online every day, but it focuses mainly on daily issues and matters of concern to the ordinary citizens.
Most people stay away from politics or taboo topics that are classified as sensitive by the state. The government, especially at the local level, has changed a lot in how it deals with citizens in recent years, largely due to popular pulse online. So there has been resistance among the people when issues affect their everyday life.
One example is the expunging of ‘low-class’ workers by the Beijing municipal government. Its unmerciful and heavy-handed approach caused uproar in the online world, and the Beijing government has changed its approach lately, and has spoken publicly in an effort to appease popular sentiment.
This does not mean that the government will become soft in dealing with similar issues, of course, but it reflects a change in the new environment, and it shows how the anger of the people must be taken into consideration by the authorities.
Madeline Earp: I don’t think anything about the internet or freedom is inevitable. If anything, the latest Freedom on the Net research underscores how many political figures around the world are using digital technology to undermine democracy through covert influence, campaigns and cyberattacks.
However, I would say that the internet has made access to all sorts of information and services much easier in China. Controlling that requires a very different level of investment, which, so far, the government has been willing to make. But even then it’s not watertight.
Right now, those who look for it can still find content that the authorities would consider subversive. It’s just that it’s unlikely to hit the mainstream, and leaves those people vulnerable to heavy criminal punishments.
Zixue, in the three years since your paper ‘Networked resistance: Digital populism, online activism, and mass dissent in China’ appeared in the International Journal of Media and Culture, do you feel the situation in China has improved for the
Zixue Tai: Yes and no. One can find both answers regarding average citizens’ access to information, depending on what cues and specifics one is looking for. There is evidence that state censorship of online networks has significantly strengthened in recent years, with the total takeover by the new regime, as seen in a series of regulations and directives on cleansing information online and overseeing conventional (print and broadcast) media.
There have been a number of news reports about the targeting of VPNs in China. VPNs have been used as a common way to bypass information control within China to access overseas websites for years. But people have noted that it has become harder and harder now to resort to that strategy, as they have become prime targets of official cracking. Also, monitoring has been tightened across popular social media sites and applications in China in the past two to three years. So in this sense, free access to information has suffered. Hence the answer ’no’.
On the other hand, more and more people have become more sophisticated in gaining access to the information they are looking for, and a growing portion of the netizen population has turned tech-savvy in ‘climbing the wall’ (the Chinese term forusing tricks to bypass the Great Firewall). So, when there is a certain type of information a segment of the people would like to get, there are ways of achieving that.
In this regard, Ethan Zuckerman proposes his ‘cute cats theory’, which claims that social media, by allowing people to share what seems to be mundane information (cats, dogs, what they eat, etc.), cultivates a way of life, and thus poses a great threat to the authoritarian regimes.
Once online networks become embedded in everyday life for ordinary people in China, they become used to the type of information they communicate among themselves, and they will likely invent ways of resistance to official control and government censorship. This is the ‘yes’ part of the answer.
In Mara Hvistendahl’s article ‘Inside China’s Vast New Experiment in Social Ranking’ in Wired5, credit scores in China are discussed. The writer claims that even old people buying fruit are paying digitally for the goods, which racks up a score. David Harvey has observed that ‘debt-encumbered home owners don’t strike’, and so this raises the question of whether the new financial systems and digital technology might play nicely into ever more strategies for control for the government?
Madeline Earp: These social credit experiments based on online activity are a concerning development. There are no meaningful privacy protections for internet users in China, so the fact that personal data is being compiled on this scale leaves many people vulnerable to leaks and exposure, for a start. And we don’t know yet the extent to which political opinion or ethnic or religious identity could factor into credit scores, but it’s obviously a concern.
Zixue Tai: That is perhaps a stretch, connecting the easypay system to government control. Up to this point, the development has been unequivocally businesslike. It is a system invented by the few commercial conglomerates to their advantage, and is marketed to the average citizens as a convenience.
Credit has never reached the level of penetration in China as seen in most Western markets, and this idea of smartphone payment suddenly caught on overnight. This is mainly due to the high penetration of smartphone apps in China, dominated by just a few big companies (Alibaba and Tencent).
Because everybody has access to these platforms, and people found out that it’s really handy. If the government wanted to use ‘debt-encumbered home owners’ as a leverage of its information control, then it could easily bite back and could get out of control in bloating the national debt, thereby crashing the economy. That is no small risk that the government will have to think about.
There has been a lot written about internet control in China. Are the people themselves aware of how much restriction there is? And is there actually a real hunger for change?
Madeline Earp: There are dissidents and businessmen who are very aware of the constraints and have to deal with daily inconvenience and risk. Then there are many others who are less aware, or less disrupted. And those in between, including some who encounter restrictions more or less by accident and are driven to dig deeper and find out why they can’t access something hosted on Facebook or a news article that is blocked.
There are plenty of people who view information control as a necessary evil, perhaps buying into the state media propaganda that it’s a measure to protect China from foreign influence. But I think the pressure point comes when ordinary people find their lives disrupted, which is happening increasingly often. Someone might criticise a local official, even in a closed chat group, and find themselves subject to an administrative fine. Or the internet might slow down dramatically around a sensitive political event, even though there are so many people who rely on a good connection to conduct daily business. That’s not acceptable, and it’s not sustainable. So it creates a sense of frustration, which builds over time into hunger for change.
The Chinese authorities talk a lot about double standards from the West, and in particular from the US, around information control (often mentioning Snowden and the revelations about mass surveillance). In your experience, does this line of argument find popular acceptance among Chinese citizens?
Zixue Tai: The answer to this question is not uniform, because the populace is quite diversified, and there is not a homogeneous group of citizens taking the same attitude.
There is certainly a segment of citizens who align themselves very well with government rhetoric and state propaganda. At the same time, there is a significant portion of the people who challenge the government talk. This is especially so among people who have a solid understanding of the West.
A lot of people are aware that the type of information control the Chinese authorities brand is not the same kind of control they experience in China. This stance is particularly common among intellectuals.
One thing of note in the past decade is that there is a special faction of Chinese citizens (the so-called leftists) who become nostalgic for some aspects of the Mao era (for example, social stability, the perceived absence of official corruption, job security, low pollution levels, and so on), and they most often side with the Chinese authorities in chastising Western countries on just about anything you can think of. But that remains a small faction, and does not speak for the overall trend.
The majority of the people don’t even care much about the presence of information control, as long as they can go about their everyday life. In other words, most people are quite happy the way it is now, and it does not matter that much to them if the government blocks their access to certain types of information. So, the weapon of the government in its ability to enforce information control is to maintain economic growth and prosperity so that the average folks stay focused on their immediate needs and pressing gratifications.
Is there any justifiable argument for the way the CPC control freedom in this way? Are people protected from harmful images or hate speech, for example, or is it really all about quashing any alternative voices?
Madeline Earp: There’s no justification for restricting freedom of expression and information, and we know that campaigns to ‘clean’ the internet aren’t successful, because there are still plenty of criminal incidents and unrest and explicit content.
Censorship hasn’t had any measurable effect on safety - on the contrary, it means citizens don’t trust the information they receive, or can’t get information when they need it most. That actually puts more people at risk.
So it’s easy for the authorities to play on people’s fears that they or their children will be exposed to danger online, but the control we’re documenting is clearly the leadership trying to protect itself.
The number of sites or social media accounts catering to political dissidents and religious or minority groups that are shut down in campaigns to clean up supposedly harmful content underlines the fact that the real target of information control is organised opposition.
Taking that into account, what are your hopes for internet freedom and digital technology in China?
Madeline Earp: Obviously I’d love to see the resources that are currently being channelled into monitoring and restricting what people can do with the internet redirected to support improved access and quality of service. Given the tightening controls we’ve documented under Xi Jinping, I think that’s unlikely to happen in the short term!
1.This information is from ChinaDaily.com: ‘BEIJING - China has 710 million internet users as of June, accounting for 51. 7 percent of its total population, exceeding the global average by 3. 1 percent, according to an official report released by the China Internet Network Information Center (CNNIC) on Wednesday’ ? Xinhua, ‘China’s internet users total 710 million’, China Daily, 4 August 2016. These statistics are backed up by the China Internet Watch (https://www. chinainternetwatch. com/whitepaper/china-internet-statistics/).
2.Definition of ‘chilling effect’ retrieved 19 October 2011 from yourdictionary.com.
3.See https://www. washingtonpost. com/world/asia_pacific/chinas-scary-lesson-tothe-world-censoring-the-internet-works/2016/05/23/413afe78-fff3-11e5-8bb1-f124a43f-84dc_story. html?utm_term=. 31206f905910.
4. An article on this subject can be viewed here: http://www. chinadaily. com. cn/business/2017-09/21/content_32295740. htm.
5. The article can be seen here: https://www. wired. com/story/age-of-social-credit/.
Additional notes:
Madeline Earp’s work can seen here: https://freedomhouse. org/expert/madeline-earp.
Madeline is currently researching and travelling in the Far East and continues as Senior Analyst at Freedom House in London.
Zixue Tai is contributing to a new book The Routledge Companion to Media and Activism, edited by Professor Graham Meikle, which will be available in mid 2018. His research and recent publications can be seen here: https://ci. uky. edu/grad/contact/tai/zixue. Zixue continues to lecture at the University of Kentucky.
Link: http://www.trebuchet-magazine.com/chinas-contemporary-cultural-revolution-excerpt/
英国《Trebuchet》杂志，2018年夏
中国当代文化革命
作者：迈克尔伊登
世界上其他国家可能要认真考虑中国力量的崛起将如何影响我们的生活了。西方霸权正在削弱，而其对全球文化的管理也是鱼龙混杂：自由与平等被奴役和剥削污染；民主与自由选举被冷漠和腐败渗入。这并不是说任何其他国家会做得更好，或者是任何其他时代都纯洁而清净，但西方可能很难继续向世界各国人民推广其价值观和理论依据，以保持它作为全球文化标准的地位。西方文化需要履行它的理想，其中多少意味着要说服世界这些理想是值得的，现在这种说服力的时代已经结束。个人自由、言论自由和信息获取自由的价值，是一个受过教育的人与机构的发展关键；此外，它们也是一个蓬勃发展的公民社会的创造性驱动因素，但它们是否一定是技术进步的自然结果？
中国正在成为现代世界势不可挡的力量，在保有地球上最大的军队的同时，其经济和软实力的影响力也在增强。如果我们将言论自由和信息获取自由视为我们生活的核心，联想到互联网，我们很可能会怀疑中国是否并非代表着我们过去的工业化时代，而是我们的未来。中国矛盾的技术繁荣带来了赢家和输家，赢家是城市中大量的百万富翁，输家是生产闪闪发亮的小玩意儿的工厂工人，他们毗邻而居，而工人们在压力下诉诸自杀。也许在这些诸般变化中最大的赢家是中国共产党，这是一个控制着超过十亿人生命的多功能监管机构，它并未被万维网这个伟大的西方海妖的竞争力所削弱。
在构造文化的力量中，全球优势的转移和磨砺来自于创造性的声音，他们通过优雅的艺术作品，在一个可能是未来人类社会模板的地带，创造新事物和新选择，以抵制同质化的扩散。
下文节选自文章中对中国艺术家朱伟和韩国艺术家Chunwoo Nam的采访。
朱伟
朱伟在北京生活和工作，他对政权的批评与他对文化的尖锐观察常合而为一。朱伟关注毛泽东策动的文革在中国造成的历史断层，它像一把锯，锯开了中国文化当中的许多传统层面，包括对艺术和历史文物的破坏。著名事例包括明万历皇帝的遗体被极端主义红卫兵挖出、痛斥、摧毁、及燃烧。
这种“清洗”曾经发生在俄罗斯和纳粹德国，它丝毫没有改善普通百姓的生活，百姓只是经常被唆使实施破坏性行为，从而保持当权者的生活。朱伟比这更进一步，认为这些断层是在破坏“集体无意识”。今天我们也看到了这些疯狂的行为，比如极端组织破坏中东前伊斯兰时代的艺术。至少朱伟实践的一部分是在重建这个曾被禁止的过去与问题多多的当下之间的联系，2018年2月8日至3月24日其展览“虚拟的焦点”将在伦敦Kristin Hjellegjerde画廊展出。
朱伟的《水墨研究课徒系列》是对传统的反思，作品使用水墨技术来检验当代社会的疾病，而当代社会中政府和个人永远对立。他笔下近乎一般人的形象意指“维稳“的接收者——这是政府为社会团结而制造出更顺从的公民的一个运动。- 朱伟：'虚拟焦点'，Kristin Hjellegjerde画廊，2018年
Trebuchet：身为一名中国艺术家，Trebuchet希望知道朱伟是否感受到了中国文化的“约束”？以及作为一个国际人物，他是否看到了西方“自由”的缺陷？
朱伟：四十年前，中国的文化大革命彻底消除了我们的文化和文明的积累。这种根除没有任何积极意义；相反，它以革命和进步的名义使我们退回到中世纪。这种倒退在世界上任何一个国家都会是灾难性的，甚至比战争的结果更糟糕。人们会知道战争的残酷，知道它注定是一场灾难，但文化的灾难却是集体无意识的，其结果是它有可能在任何时候更大规模地再来一次，因为人们已经积累了类似运动的经验。
中国接过了全球力量的缰绳，在世界上变得越来越重要，这是否体现在中国人民的态度和观点上？
谦虚向他人学习在中国是一种稀缺品质。文化大革命的十年洗礼后人们都习惯了假大空，成年人说真话后会脸红，甚至好几天都忐忑不安，就好像他们讲了一个谎言。在上世纪80年代，中国刚刚打开大门对外开放，那时候我们谦虚过一阵子，但没维持多久，人们就开始认为西方国家也没什么好的。
原因是我们仍然生活在两个不同的时空。从表面上看，我们似乎彼此相关，但实际上我们是两条平行的轨道。比如，在改革开放之前，政治运动是主流，每个中国人都重视理想，鄙视财富，越穷越时髦，姑娘最爱最贫穷的人。那时候中国人认为西方国家都没有理想，他们太现实，太具体了，应该受到批判。
到了20世纪80年代，改革开放了，经济运动成为主流，政府主张少数人先富起来，然后整个社会开始无休止地追求财富。人们爱最富有的人，人们爱富有的西方国家。当中国人出国旅行时，他们发现有时西方国家的人不那么富裕，有些人甚至看起来很穷；他们忽略了大多数西方人都有宗教信仰，大多数西方国家都有一个平衡的发达的社会，继而开始认为西方国家太不现实，太理想，所以似乎不值得学习。
你的很多作品描绘了不满的沉思的士兵/军官。请问在中国没有参与武装冲突的情况下，国家维持目前的军队规模和军费开支，中国中产阶级是否会对此感到不安？
这是常识，但我们知道得太晚，因为没有这方面的教育。以前当兵的时候我只知道吃得差，各方面的生活条件都差，当时我认为政府应该拨给军队更多的钱，好改善一下条件。我不知道军队有那么多钱，也不知道政府的钱其实是纳税人支付的。
你的作品《帷幕》具有双重含义：因为中国文化中红色显然是吉祥的，对共产主义的意指被一种希望感所削弱。也就是说，帷幕往往是破碎的，有很多洞。你能解释一下这些概念之间的关系吗？
中国几千年的历史与红色关系不大。在一些朝代，皇帝将自己与黄色联系在一起，黄色代表皇室的尊严和优雅，如清朝。红色来自西方，代表共产主义、革命、和进步。六十多年来直到今天，红色都是红色政权的象征。准确地记录社会特征是艺术家的义务和责任。
我二十六岁时就出名了。成名在年轻的时候感觉很好，但现在我认为这是一种负担，因为你的每一步都会被很多人注意到，这将导致谨慎和对失败的恐惧。我放弃了不少实验，其中一些真的有可能会很成功。
你用传统技巧创造了一个似乎是敏感人物的马克思形象，但这个形象以及与之为伴的恩格斯的形象，给人的感觉尚不清楚。他们的脸似乎被擦掉了，或者好像是在磨砂玻璃后面。你对马克思及其遗产有什么感觉？
马克思是欧洲众多哲学家当中的一个，他在中国因其《资本论》和其他理论享有盛名，到今天马克思列宁主义仍然是这个国家的指导思想和所有人都应遵循的指导方针。我是不太喜欢，他的理论可能不成熟，至少在他的祖国已经过时和被遗弃了。托没遵循他理论的福，德国今天是一个富裕和受人尊敬的国家。马克思的遗产是一个普通的过时的空谈，比如对“剩余价值”的讨论。
你的关于梦的画作很有启发性。这种梦的形象在英国相对还未被观察到（梦在英国被视为睡眠的副产品），是一种转变形式。我们看起来似乎拥有自由，比如在互联网上获取信息的自由，但又是一种分心，并不一定能帮助我们变得更好，或更自由和有创造性。你认为两种文化中的人都梦想得太小了吗？
你的问题显示了两种文明的差异，这是两种不同的梦。今天在中国，甚至连艺术家和文化学者都在谈钱，谈怎么赚到更多的钱。你赚钱越多，你就越成功。自由在这里是很具体的，比如，你有更多的钱，你就感到更自由，你可以做任何你想做的事情。当然，前提是活着，然后你可以吃，喝，旅行，买房地产，更换汽车，更换妻子。当有14亿人在追求相同的游戏时，你可以想象它有多么残酷。
作为一个成熟的画家，是什么在激励你继续创作艺术？
我和其他中国当代艺术的区别是我用的是本土媒材，它来自东方，与西方当代艺术不同步，有自己的特色和审美方式。我每一个创作的出发点都是创新，动机是记录并留下这个时代的一些东西和特征。
Chunwoo Nam
与朱伟相反，Chunwoo Nam的数码版画定调稍微不同。作为一个韩裔美国人，Chunwoo Nam凭借他的文化多元性，与两个大国都尽量保持距离，从而看到以中国和美国为代表的东方和西方的消极面和积极面。他的作品《我们在这》系列（下图）荣获2011首尔国际版画双年展大奖，他目前在美国居住和工作。
Chunwoo Nam最近更名为《他们的全球化》的作品系列有着两极评价，一方解读为呼吁更多融合，另一方解读为庆祝融合与共存。
曾经一度的文化敌人现已成为战友。共产主义者和资本主义者围绕他们以前的意识形态一同共舞，文化与商品和货币贸易纠缠不清。在这套版画中韩裔艺术家Chunwoo Nam视觉再现了这种文化共存关系，并质疑将两种文化分隔许久的意识形态差异。通过结合二者的权力符号（其国旗）和地点（天安门广场，时代广场），他的视觉图像体现了这种缩小全球距离和文化鸿沟的共存关系。Chunwoo似乎要告诉我们，“跳起来吧！” - 克莱街出版社
然而，与上述引文相符的那种积极的第一印象最近已经破灭，对这系列作品的更名意味着疏离化和异化。以新添加的、用数字混印中美国国旗的这件醒目的作品为例：欢舞的形象消失，在熟悉的中国五角星之下是破碎却坚挺的美元，它们奇怪地被限制在竖条隔栏之后。金钱及其流通性是“他们的全球化”的动力。
Chunwoo Nam最近在《个人故事VI》中探索了互联网的意义。这件作品更加个性化和忧郁，但内涵的感受度和人性使之引人注目：
流行文化圣地保持着沉默，提醒了我们在这个全球经济时代，社会阶层和通往信息、财务和互联网的渠道才是界定文化的基础。美国文化往往侧重于同化，会孤立文化局外人，就好像在一个偏远之地，人们如草般慢慢成长，然后逐渐吞没和掩埋现代都市的遗迹。- Essye Klempner，全民教育中心，纽约
东西方势力的负面和正面
在中国有一些防止其网民访问真相的障碍和控制，在美国和西方这很难发生，但我们是否在乎真相？我们怎样使用这些信息？我们是不是会干脆转身离开，去看一些更有趣的信息？这个问题使我想起美国最有洞察力的作家之一，雷·布拉德伯里的心态：
关于《华氏451》最需要了解的不是政府审查（布拉德伯里是如此肯定这一点，甚至在某次加州大学洛杉矶分校的课堂上，因其学生持反对意见，他离开了教室），消防队员不会听从几个阴森的老大哥的命令烧书，他们烧书，是因为主角盖伊蒙塔格被告知，社会需要屏蔽这类知识上的可怕杂音，屏蔽不同观点带来的恐怖，屏蔽在不同观点间进行选择的负担，以及屏蔽深刻而麻烦的思想。- 克里斯泰勒，“《华氏451》：难道布拉德伯里的反乌托邦成真了吗？“，mashable.com（2012年6月6日）
布拉德伯里的态度是臭名昭着的，因为它并不完全符合当前的自由主义共识，即一股邪恶的力量正阻止我们变得伟大。然而，正如泰勒所观察到的那样，他觉得我们根本无法解决棘手的问题，因为我们宁愿面对一些更轻松的主题。这是对美国流行文化的一种深入探讨，当我们批评中国对信息自由的态度时，这也是一个不容忽视的教训。Chunwoo Nam的作品有往这个方向讨论的趋势，包括他对他的女儿在面对中美洲文化时同化程度的观察。
我们拥有的自由可能是复杂而苦乐参半的，远非完整。我们可以感到自信，但也别忘了我们通往自由的过程比在中国更好。异化似乎是普遍的，东西方都是共同的。中国当局则热衷于在个人自由方面将他们的干预与美国政府相提并论。
文章链接：http://www.trebuchet-magazine.com/chinas-contemporary-cultural-revolution-excerpt/ |
