I have extremely romantic feelings towards of the images produced by communist countries in their propaganda posters. Although I understand the implications of what they mean I find them beautiful in an aesthetic way.
The one look that I find most appealing are the women whose hairs are tied in braids on the side. A lot of the feminist art or grrl power art in America, especially in zines co-opt images of 50s womanhood cut out of magazines and re-appropriated with the words and politics of now. Those images mean very little to me although I can understand the ideology behind them because I have my own. Part of me wants to put sarcastic comment beneath them, much like I did with the images of American woman when I worked on a zine called Yummi Hussi in California, but somehow I can’t bring myself to.
For the most part, I can be rather “disrespectful” towards the establishment and also imagery for the sake of art, but when it comes to these posters I am a little afraid to. Somehow the power of these posters and the meaning behind them, along with the real history of the horrors of what went on renders them untouchable.
Which I must think about because if it makes me uncomfortable to do so, it means maybe I should, which as I said before is to me the whole point of conceptual art: to question what is and bring new perspectives on how we view things.
(Okay. I decided if I can’t be the person to put the words down, what I can do is juxtaposition these romantic images with the realities of what was going on at that time with the pictures of Li Zhensheng.)
What is the Cultural Revolution?
Women Can Hold up Half the Sky; Surely the Face of Nature Can Be Transformed
Wang Dawei 王大為
1975, Tianjin
–Stefan Landsberger’s Chinese Propaganda Poster Pages
–Picturing Power: Posters of the Cultural Revolution
–The virtual Museum of the Cultural Revolution
Yan Sham-Shackleton Online 
Interesting!!
(Said recognizing the fact that the posters are ominous …)
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A past era…
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