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Mid-century
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Circa 1960's Original Painting China's Cultural Revolution Propaganda
The Art of China's Cultural Revolution
Shortly after the founding of the People’s Republic of China in 1949, Mao Zedong declared that art should serve the people. In determining what forms of art would best do so, artists debated between two aesthetic directions: the Soviet socialist realist style, based on European oil painting traditions; or guohua (“national painting”), the modernization of traditional Chinese ink painting. Until the mid 1960s, both approaches were allowed to coexist in art training and practice, as long as works of art served the masses and did not criticize the state.
Everything changed during the Great Proletariat Cultural Revolution of 1966–1976. Forced to serve political and propaganda purposes under enormous pressure from guidelines of the Central Cultural Revolution Group, led by Mao’s fourth wife Jiang Qing, works of art were expected to foment revolution and, in her words, be “red, bright, and shining” (hong, guang, liang), like Jiang Qing’s revolutionary operas. The Cultural Revolution pitted young people against older generations so that many revered artists and artistic traditions suffered humiliation and destruction, as did untold numbers of people perceived to be bourgeois. Political woodblock prints and the Soviet socialist realist style, but with Chinese characteristics, provided the sanctioned models for the proliferation of posters, paintings, and Mao badges that would fuel revolutionary fervor and the cult of Chairman Mao and his thought.
Size: approx. 24 x 36 inches
Condition: the canvas is not stretched, stretcher marks remain but no wood stretchers are available. The painting has been rolled and stored in the estate for approx. 10 years. The canvas is wrinkled and some paint loss and the ground has cracked from being rolled.
Description: Circa late 1960’s original oil on Canvas Painting of Chinese Cultural Revolution Art/ Propaganda. Three figures crowd around a book, one with arm band with gun will another solider holds open a book, woman stands behinds them reading with the two soldiers.
If you have any questions or if you need additional images, please feel free to contact me.
Shortly after the founding of the People’s Republic of China in 1949, Mao Zedong declared that art should serve the people. In determining what forms of art would best do so, artists debated between two aesthetic directions: the Soviet socialist realist style, based on European oil painting traditions; or guohua (“national painting”), the modernization of traditional Chinese ink painting. Until the mid 1960s, both approaches were allowed to coexist in art training and practice, as long as works of art served the masses and did not criticize the state.
Everything changed during the Great Proletariat Cultural Revolution of 1966–1976. Forced to serve political and propaganda purposes under enormous pressure from guidelines of the Central Cultural Revolution Group, led by Mao’s fourth wife Jiang Qing, works of art were expected to foment revolution and, in her words, be “red, bright, and shining” (hong, guang, liang), like Jiang Qing’s revolutionary operas. The Cultural Revolution pitted young people against older generations so that many revered artists and artistic traditions suffered humiliation and destruction, as did untold numbers of people perceived to be bourgeois. Political woodblock prints and the Soviet socialist realist style, but with Chinese characteristics, provided the sanctioned models for the proliferation of posters, paintings, and Mao badges that would fuel revolutionary fervor and the cult of Chairman Mao and his thought.
Size: approx. 24 x 36 inches
Condition: the canvas is not stretched, stretcher marks remain but no wood stretchers are available. The painting has been rolled and stored in the estate for approx. 10 years. The canvas is wrinkled and some paint loss and the ground has cracked from being rolled.
Description: Circa late 1960’s original oil on Canvas Painting of Chinese Cultural Revolution Art/ Propaganda. Three figures crowd around a book, one with arm band with gun will another solider holds open a book, woman stands behinds them reading with the two soldiers.
If you have any questions or if you need additional images, please feel free to contact me.
Detail photos Click to enlarge
