Tiananmen Exiles Flourish on Australian Art Scene

Chinese-born artist Guo Jian is pictured in front of one of his paintings on show in his Sydney studio March 23, 2004. The painting, titled ‘Demonstrator’ refers to an incident where he was taught to kill while in China’s People’s Liberation Army (PLA). Guo, 40, is one of the many avant-garde Chinese artists who have moved overseas since the 1989 Tiananmen pro-democracy protest, which China still labels as counter-revolutionary. (Will Burgess/Reuters)

Tiananmen Exiles Flourish on Australian Art Scene
Thu Apr 15, 9:12 AM ET

By Ang Bee Lin

SYDNEY (Reuters) – In a Sydney garage that Chinese artist Guo Jian calls home, pictures of half-naked women hang alongside communist propaganda posters while unfinished works lie on the floor.

Guo, 40, is one of many avant-garde Chinese artists who moved overseas after Chinese troops crushed the Tiananmen Square democracy protests in 1989.

Nearly 15 years after the massacre, in which hundreds, perhaps thousands, were killed, the works of these exiles have given Australian art an Asian flavor.

“It was an incredible cultural coup for Australia to get the sort of intellectual input that New York got with the Second World War,” said Sydney art gallery-owner Ray Hughes.

Guo, one of the many hunger-strikers during the Beijing protests and a former soldier in the People’s Liberation Army, said images of students gunned down by soldiers still haunt him.

“I demonstrated from the beginning to the end. I did the hunger strike and I was the last one left in Tiananmen Square,” said Guo, now an Australian resident.

Guo was blacklisted for his participation in the Tiananmen protests, that ended with a military crackdown June 3 and 4.

“My passport approval did not come until three years later and I could not find any work during those three years,” said Guo, who came from Guizhou, one of China’s poorest provinces in the southwest.

“I am still nervous whenever I return to China. I feel like I am constantly being watched,” he said.

ARTISTIC PROTEST

Cluttered with paint brushes and magazines, Guo’s lock-up garage features a work in bold colors portraying a bunch of grinning Chinese soldiers in their uniforms, smoking and frolicking with scantily clad female companions.

The painting stands in sharp contrast to a fairly recent, but dog-eared, propaganda poster of Chinese fighter planes and tanks. In bold Chinese characters, the poster reads: “Let’s show off our military might.”

An erotic and satirical portrayal of the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) is everywhere in Guo’s art.

“China has a very strong military culture. If you walk on the streets in Australia, how many soldiers would you see in a day? Probably none. In China, they are everywhere,” said Guo.

The PLA, with 2.5 million troops, is the world’s largest standing army.

Untitled: Guo Jian

Guo’s three-story-high “Trigger Happy” painting, displayed on a Melbourne street corner just after the Sept. 11 attacks of 2001, outraged many who said his work was offensive.

“Trigger Happy” portrayed half-naked Chinese soldiers with toy guns, laughing in a war-like scene of exploding planes, with a naked couple embracing in the middle of the painting.

TIANANMEN DIASPORA

Guo sold his latest painting for A$30,000 ($23,000) compared with the A$50 each he earned for his early works, but he is not the only Chinese artist of his generation who is now making waves in Australia with provocative and controversial work.

Among the best-known are Ah Xian, Guan Wei and Shen Jiawei, all of whom survived Mao Zedong’s 10-year Cultural Revolution in which hundreds of thousand were killed, works of art and monuments destroyed, and intellectuals and artists humiliated.

Shen Jia Wei: Third World (2002)

All three chose to leave their homeland after the Tiananmen massacre and settle in Australia.

Guan, whose father was in the famous Peking Opera, said he moved to Australia because he was disappointed with the Chinese authorities after Tiananmen. “Before that I had no thoughts about leaving China,” he said.

One of Guan’s most famous works, “Dow Islands,” is a whimsical and almost animated display of three land masses in a vast expanse of blue, spread across 48 panels with numerous boats carrying people struggling to reach land.

Guan Wei’s Dow Island

“It is about migration, voyage and refugees looking for a safe haven,” said Guan, who recently sold the painting for A$100,000 to the National Gallery in Canberra.

Ah Xian, who was granted political asylum in Australia in 1990, has won awards with his expressionless porcelain body-casts, each tattooed or painted with traditional Chinese motifs, such as the imperial dragon.

Ah Xian: China China Series

BEIJING SENSITIVE

Gene Sherman, director of Sydney’s Sherman Galleries, said the post-Tiananmen diaspora did not just benefit Australia.

“They are everywhere, some traveled to Germany, others to the United States, Paris and Japan.”

Most Chinese artists started their careers painting images of beaming peasants and model workers for the propaganda posters popular during the heady days of Maoism.

(See: Shen Jiawei “Standing Guard for Our Great Motherland” iconic Cultural Revolution Poster)

Many are aware that the Chinese influence in their work is a powerful source of appeal to a largely Western audience.

Gallery owners in Australia said in today’s China, where many have become property moguls, stockbrokers and flashy millionaires, Chinese authorities have displayed tolerance for abrasive urban art.

But some artists still hesitate to show their work in China. “China’s economy is booming but politically China has not progressed,” said Wang Xu, famed for his traditional brush and ink paintings.

Gallery-owner Hughes, who travels to China fairly frequently, said art works that were too political would fail to win the Communist Party’s approval, even today.

photos and articles:

Ray Hughes Gallery, Sydney: List of Chinese Artists

Articles (Linked to name above)

Guan Wei’s Dow Island: ART AND HUMAN RIGHTS: WITNESSING TO SILENCE

Art in America: Ah Xian

Red Eye: Shen Jiawei is a former Chinese Red Guard

Guo Jian: Liberating the artist from the revolution