The success of “Encircling the Cities from the Rural Areas” has determined the “political correctness” of “the presentation of the heroic images of workers, peasants and soldiers”, and the images of them have become “enthusiastic and glamorous perfections in high spirits”. Belonging to the same political concept, workers, peasants and soldiers are different only in their clothes and even the males and females of them look alike. This phenomenon of uniformity is not uncommon in traditional art; it can also be found in Rococo of France and Beijing Opera, both of which feminize the images of males to unify the images of both genders as a whole. Local realist paintings produced after the presentation of the “glamorous perfections” reduced the peasants to the original state of “farming under the sun”, while at that time, the peasants were among the first group of Chinese people who became better-off with the implementation of ownership reform. Although the standard of a well-off life could not be compared to that of the present days, the life of peasants had been improved greatly; in some rural areas where the township enterprises prospered, the peasants lived even better than the urban citizens. The concept of “Vegetable Basket Project”- a project aiming at promoting the supply of vegetables and fruits to the cities from the rural areas- could be the epitome of the living standard at that time.

With the extension of the system reform from rural areas to cities, rural areas gradually lost its first-mover advantage and the advantage in policy. Cities have exceeded rural areas in many ways,

which impels peasants to leave their land and make a living in big cities, making “Spring Transportation” a big problem. The “agriculture-to-non-agriculture transfer” reflects the characteristics of Chinese society and the phrase “peasant worker” is frequently used by government and media. The issue of “peasant workers” and “three agricultures” has become a controversial problem of Chinese society in the process of the “agriculture-to-non-agriculture transfer”. Once entering the city and becoming one of the peasant workers, a peasant has lost his value as a traditional peasant. His labor can only buy him working conditions and social status at the bottom and a living condition which is even worse than that in the rural areas. At the same time, the change of ideas brought about by the “agriculture-to-non-agriculture transfer” will ultimately make the word “peasant” a pronoun for ignorance and obstinacy. That’s why peasants have been playing a ridiculous part in the political pop art and the gaudy art long before. Zhao Xiaodong chose peasant as his mine of artistic creation under this historical background.

Peasant workers of Chongqing are called “bangbang” – a nickname originally referred to porters. However, it doesn’t mean that they do nothing else; they are called “bangbang” because the carrying poles are the most significant signature of them. The biggest difference between “bangbangs” in Chongqing and peasant workers in other cities is that they do not gather around factories or construction fields like peasant workers in other cities do; instead, they scatter in every corner of the city. Go out of Zhao Xiaodong’s studio and go down the slope, one can see simple houses for “bangbangs” all the way. According to Zhao Xiaodong, he can see “bangbangs” going up and down everyday, and that’s why he rent his studio here. But the choice of environment is not only about convenience; it is also getting the artist closer and closer to his expressive objects, influencing the artist’s attitude toward his expressive objects. There is an apparent transition in Zhao Xiaodong’s recent works, from the sarcastic seek of novelty to sympathy, then to the interpretation of human nature, which is reflected in his works by the transition from the emphasis on the external features such as scenes, plots, clothes and expressions, to the concentration on the melancholy facial expressions, then to the ID-picture-like portraits. Both irony and sympathy are attitudes harbored from a higher place, the only difference of which is whether it is out of malice or goodwill; while the interpretation of human nature is a careful observation and exposure. Of course this does not mean that the works have excluded the artist’s subjectivity because, after all, the observation and exposure belong to Zhao Xiaodong. Several art notes written by Zhao Xiaodong are quoted here, from which we can roughly see this transition:

I’ve tried to pay close attention to their living state, recording their life to convey a convincing emotion and purposefully find love and beauty from dilapidation. Passionate and forceful strokes are used to represent their spirit. To me, the most important thing is to depict the “real” scenes…to create a fancy environment filled with vigor, symbolically representing the pursuit of the peasant workers’ future life with a sense of perplexity.

March, 2005

People may assume that they are leading a hard life. I, on the other hand, find them living in comfort and ease — working bareback and making fun of each other. Standing with them, we will appear to be unnatural. Many works today concentrate on the presentation of the peasant workers’ hard work and bitter life with sympathy out of humanitarianism, while works genuinely and completely recording all the aspects of their life seem to be scarce. Actually they are also living happily, singing and drinking.

August, 2007

After completing the series “Tiao Zhuan (carrying bricks)”, I’ve found that paintings with no background look nice and clean, leaving the workers themselves the only focus. The color of the muscles and the clothes are executed with more freedom, while the facial expressions have receded. However, a breakthrough on the execution of border lines is expected, because the relationship between tensity and looseness shall not be only presented in strokes and textures.

November, 2007

By putting much emphasis on Zhao Xiaodong’s artistic transition from recording to sympathy, then to exposure, I’m not saying that the first two stages are worthless. What I’m trying to say is that, compared to the paintings concentrating on plot, thought and concept, portraits concentrating on human nature is a weak aspect in Chinese art, because the value of Chinese artistic ideological system is not widely acknowledged. Under this circumstance, the recent works of the artist may easily be deemed as a kind of regress.

Western Realism has influenced Chinese art mainly in the production of figure paintings; the influence on portraits is far less than that on theme or plot paintings. Paintings of “big faces” are not portraits in the strictest sense, but a partial close-up of the theme paintings. Strictly speaking, a portrait presents the general features of the figure painted, not a certain state or expression at a certain time. ID pictures are closest to this idea, in which figures are not connected to any scene, plot or emotion – “big faces” with no external burden. Leaders’ photos hung up in public places are amplified versions of their original photos, and their greatness lies in the position of the photos as well as their status in the audience’s (people’s) heart, not in the image itself. That’s why with the emergence of photography, portraits gradually declined. However, only a good photographer can take pictures up to the level of good portraits, because photographers may miss the very moment when the general features of a person is best reflected. That’s why we often see that a figure in the photo is not much like the person him or herself. Portrait painters, however, can present the general features of a person by evading all the untypical moments. The most significant difference between Zhao Xiaodong’s recent works and his earlier works is the transition of focus from plot and concept to portrait, from contingency to necessity.

I once mentioned in one of my articles that Chinese painting pursues “vitality and vivacity”, while Western painting emphasizes the nature of things. Since “modernity” is the nature of modern times, and “animality” is the nature of animals, “humanity” is of course the nature of human being. Nature is all about necessity and generality, excluding all the accidental factors. When it is applied to the production of portraits, painters only record who the object is instead of other accidental factors such as where he is, what he is doing, or whether he is happy or not. In Chinese art education, the purpose of the training of portraits concentrates on the plot, concept or idea – that is to say, the contingency – not human nature or its necessity. Hence, the portraits at exhibitions or published are either teaching achievements/ learning models, or sketches of the artists, not belonging to the category of formal works. This is mainly because of the Chinese pursuit of “vitality and vivacity” and its rejecting the Western tradition of the pursuit of nature, although other reasons cannot be precluded.

The recent works by Zhao Xiaodong is the inevitable result out of his involvement with peasant workers, which more reflect the humanity of the observed. To both the Chinese and Chinese art, it is a blind area of understanding, and the condition is no better in literature. To grow in such a barren field is apparently difficult. Although the essential theory is being challenged by modern Western philosophy, what China needs is to establish the essential theory, which can be applied to the production of figure paintings in order to reveal human nature other than telling adventurous or special experiences of others.