Possibilities, Concerns and Constraints
During the lead-up to the 2008 Beijing Olympics, the censorious attitude that characterized China’s post-1989 official response to contemporary art gave way to a new market-driven, culture-industry valuation of art. This talk presents three moments of cultural encounter involving artists, curators, and officials to examine, through a feminist lens, the interlocking power dynamics in this transformational moment and rapid rise of Chinese contemporary art into a global phenomenon. These sites include the design and marketing of the Grand MOMA real estate development; Dancing with Migrant Workers art project at the East Modern Art Center; and artistic responses to the 2008 Sichuan earthquake. The last case focuses on the work of Lei Yan to open a feminist sightline of comparison with Ai Weiwei’s bad boy art of political dissent.