Our friends at Beijing Today swing by now and then to introduce art and culture in the city.

Life is a complex, blending the normal and the absurd in often disorienting combinations. That mystery and confusion inspires Liu Yichao, a 25-year old artist whose paintings meld weird creatures and narratives to invite the viewer into an illogical but familiar place.

“Artists born in earlier generations often name ancient paintings as their favorites because these survived China’s cultural and social upheavals,” Liu says. “But speaking for myself, my art is inspired by childhood memories, personal experience and the way I see the world.”

Born in Huizhou, a humid costal city of Guangdong province, Liu spent most of his childhood catching fish and playing in the subtropical forests. Although he never studied art until middle school, his childhood experiences significantly shaped his artistic language.

In Drama, his ongoing series, Liu depicts a clown swimming in a lush broad-leaved forest. Created using different shades of green, the image gives a strong sense of freshness and freedom.

“I’m a nostalgic person, and many of my works are related to my experiences. My childhood environment lets me appreciate sea life. The freedom of marine fish is what I long for the most,” Liu says.

That nostalgia can also be found in Big Cat and His Toy, a 2013 painting. In the picture, Liu presents himself as a boy with a cat face who sits in front of a fish-shaped boat. Although the imagery appears surreal at first glance, closer examination conveys as sense of loneliness and isolation.

It’s nothing new for young artists to feel confused and anxious while groping for truth in society, but Liu does an impeccable job of translating this collective uncertainty into his own artistic language. His personal emotions shine through in each work.

In Sorrows (above), Liu depicts a love triangle between a skeleton, a mannequin and a clown. The clown’s face is so vivid that viewers can feel his disappointment and the pain of losing his lover. By contrast, Happiness shows a sweet mood in which a girl dances to the rhythm of a drum-headed musician. Although there are many weird elements in these works, Liu’s warm tones make the pictures unexpectedly reasonable.

That atmosphere has continued in Liu’s work since graduation. Since finishing his studies at the Central Academy of Fine Arts in 2013, his paintings have grown ever more anxious.

In Playing with Fires in 2014, Liu captures a scene of five cigarettes surrounding a burning bonfire in a quiet park. The anthropomorphized cigarettes have a curving appearance that leaves the viewer space to imagine.

“When I painted that picture, I had just graduated from school and was confused about the future. Then I started to smoke and thought the nicotine would help kill the pain. I was like a boy playing with fire to escape from the adult world,” he says.

As with many young artists, the pain Liu expresses through his work is a necessary step for growing up. But as an artist who regards art as an ideal, the only thing he can do is hang on and wait for change in a seemingly static state, just like the plants in his pictures.

“I appreciate the growing process of plants. They develop in a static state, which seems a bit like my personality,” Liu says.

“It’s hard to make a living as a young and unknown artist. But I still find satisfaction and pleasure every time I finish a new work. Staying optimistic and sticking to our dreams is essential.”

This post originally appeared in Beijing Today. It’s republished here with permission.

Our friends at Beijing Today swing by now and then to introduce art and culture in the city.

It’s hard to imagine that the Tibetan inspired art of Wang Yiguang is the work of a man who grew up on the North China Plain. But Tibet’s vigorous yaks, winding railways and cheerful girls have been the subject of Wang’s creations since he first set foot on the magical plateau in 2002.

Unlike his Tibet-obsessed peers who focus on the scenery of the Tanggula Mountains and highland prairies, Wang expresses his love for the plateau through super-realist images of flying animals and Tibetans living in a dreamy and harmonious environment.

“I believe in animism and have always tried to find an appropriate way to express it through the interaction between humans and nature,” Wang says. “But the way escaped me until I came to Tibet.”

Born in 1962 in Linyi, Shandong province, Wang grew up with two artistic brothers and started to paint in middle school. When the Cultural Revolution ended and education resumed in 1977, Wang sat China’s first college entrance exam and was admitted to a local art school. He was assigned to work as an art teacher in Shandong province in 1980.

“To be honest, the reason I chose art as my major was because I just wanted to stay in the city. But the more I painted, the more I became fascinated with the art,” Wang says. After graduating from the Central Academy of Fine Arts with a master’s degree in oil painting in 1988, Wang became a graphic designer at the China Railway Construction Corporation.

The majority of Wang’s earlier works were realist paintings that displayed the daily life of villagers prior to the 1990s. But slowly, his work began to morph into neo-realism that combined the power of reality and the romance of imagination. The shift became obvious after he participated in the construction of Qinghai-Tibet Railway in 1992.

In the Fragrance of Kelsang Flowers, Wang depicts a local girl opening her arms and flying into the sky over a sea of highland flowers. The view of the yak’s back makes it seem the carefree girl is sharing her happiness with the creature.

The combination of Tibetan girls and yaks appear in many of Wang’s other works such as After Rian, painted in 2004, and Silent Communication, painted in 2014. Wang is obsessed with the poetic comparison between the Tibetan girls and the yaks, creatures with powerful energy and life force.

“The first time I went to the Tibetan Plateau I fainted due to altitude sickness and oxygen deficiency. The only thing I could do during my first couple days was lie on the grass and gasp for air,” Wang says. “But local kids and yaks could play so freely and happily around me. They were like the Flying Apsaras of the Duhuang Frescoes. That physical reaction let me admire the power of life on the Tibetan Plateau.”

Construction workers on the Qinghai-Tibet Railway are also an important theme in Wang’s work. In Full Moon Over Tanggula, painted in 2005, Wang captures the conditions of railway workers at the foot of snowcapped mountains. The glow of sunset and dancing locals offer a warm and cheerful sense.

“The Qinghai-Tibet Railway, construction workers and daily life on the plateau are the ore of my art. Strong artistic language can only come from the combination of the right artistic approach and the ability to capture life’s details,” Wang says.

Check out more paintings over at Wang Yiguang’s gallery.

This post originally appeared in Beijing Today.

Our friends at Beijing Today swing by now and then to introduce art and culture in the city.

The consumption power of Chinese travelers once again grabbed headlines during the Spring Festival holiday. But instead of luxury watches or baby formulas, it’s Japanese toilet seats that have tourists going wild.

The seats, which provide sterilization, warm rinse and massage features, have become the top products on shopping lists, and many tourists are buying two or more seats as gifts for friends and relatives. The toilet seats are typically priced 2,000 yuan before tax.

“They are always out of stock. If we replenish our stock in the morning, everything will be sold out by the afternoon. The Chinese tourists buy everything in only a few hours,” said Li Wei, a saleswoman at an appliance shop in Tokyo’s Akihabara district.

“Every shop on the street was sold out of toilet seats during Spring Festival,” she said.

Apart from toilet seats, tourists also targeted Japanese miniature appliances and household articles such as hair dryers, vacuum cups, electric cookers and ceramic knives.

The gadget obsession has been growing since 2010.

“I think they are built better, and they look delicate and have more user-orientated features,” said a tourist who would only be identified by her surname Zhao.

Ironically, it’s exactly such products that helped Chinese manufacturers build their reputation for rock bottom prices the past two decades. That Chinese are suddenly shopping for the same products in Japan betrays a staggering crisis of faith.

Panic Shopping

Growing affluence and a willingness to spend have led much of the world to brand Chinese tourists as walking wallets.

Statistics from the Tourism Department of the State of California show the per capita consumption of Chinese tourists reached $2,932. Chinese tourists beat out Brazilians, the No. 2 shoppers, by more than $500 in 2012.

In 2013, Chinese tourists overtook the Indonesians as the biggest spenders in Singapore with per capita consumption of SG $1,136.

China’s increasingly wealthy buy whatever they want while abroad to satisfy their suppressed desires for material goods. However, their adoration of foreign products has become a controversy at home.

“It’s a national humiliation that China refuses to consume its own products,” said Wu Huifang, a Hong Kong judge who ruled on a case of baby formula smuggling on February 6.

Wu said public distrust for domestic products has somehow resulted in the formation of international smuggling rings for a baffling assortment of benign goods.

But it’s not entirely hard to understand given the country has been rocked by scandals that involved child-killing baby formulas and cancer-causing cooking oils.

Business insiders say China’s foreign appliances worship fills a different need.

“The demands of Chinese consumers are diversifying. They are no longer satisfied with low-cost and reliable products. They want novelty and durability,” said Zhang Qin, a business reporter for Beijing Youth Daily.

The rush for Japanese toilet seats reflects how domestic products have failed to keep the pace with consumer demands, Zhang said.

In the meantime, e-commerce and Internet access have strengthened consumers’ search for individualized and diverse products, said Ding Yang, an analyst at Tencent.

The Made-in-China Model

In front of increasingly mature and picky consumers, Chinese manufacturers have to accept that their advantages are disappearing as costs rise and innovation remains stagnant.

Data from the US-China Chamber of Commerce show that 61 percent of enterprises in China regarded rising labor costs as their most urgent challenge in 2015. Boston Consulting Group shared the view and said Chinese manufacturers will entirely lose their advantage within five years.

“The Made-in-China miracle depends on an incredible advantage in raw material costs, taxes and labor,” said Wu Xiaobo, a financial writer in Hangzhou. “But the steady erosion of all three is leaving Chinese manufacturers in a bad situation, and the low prices are decreasingly attractive to domestic shoppers.”

While Chinese manufacturers have been attempting to swap technology to catch up, that shortcut ignores their fundamental shortcomings in innovation and brand development, Wu said.

This is especially true for domestic appliance vendors.

Chinese small appliance firms like Haier and Midea have attempted to cooperate with Sanyo and Panasonic since the 1990s. Known for their outstanding imitative ability and low-price marketing, the domestic vendors quickly grabbed market share.

But the Japanese companies, realizing it was impossible to compete on price, focused instead on cultivating high-end clients and loyal users. The firms have also slowed the export of their core technologies to Chinese rivals and have suspended many of their China operations.

“China’s manufacturers can hardly copy American-style innovation that is focused on breaking new ground,” said Zhu Haibing, chief economist for JP Morgan in Greater China. “The more realistic path is for them to enhance efficiency and improve the quality of China’s existing manufacturing industry. Only in this way will the industry find its confidence and regain the trust of native residents.”

This post originally appeared in Beijing Today.

Our friends at Beijing Today swing by now and then to introduce art and culture in the city.

Few things can poison an artist’s development quite like early fame. And when fame comes knocking, it takes a lot to cast it away and reboot one’s art career in an unfamiliar world. Illustrator Lisk Feng made that tough decision three years ago when she left her hometown behind to build her skills and begin a new career in the US.

Feng was born and grew up in Haining, Zhejiang province. Her mother, also an artist, encouraged Feng to study violin, clarinet and choir as a child.

“But I found illustration was my true love,” she says. “After passing the entrance exam for senior high, I started to play an online doodling game and found the fun of painting. I gave up my violin and online games to embrace art.”

A combination of natural talent and dedicated practice brought Feng to the attention of the art community, and she began to serialize her illustrations in teen magazines. She published Tong, her first album of paintings, while still a sophomore in 2011.

Known for her warm and sweet style and moving stories, Feng won loads of adolescent fans. In the following two years, she was busy with autographs sessions for her albums.

“People were already calling me an influential and successful illustrator, but that label really confused me,” Feng says. The approval and economic independence showed her what could succeed in China.

“But at the same time, I felt like a machine rather than an artist who poured her energy into creating better works,” she says.

For Feng, saying goodbye to her past “success” and starting an art journey in a new environment was the best way to grow. After graduating from China Academy of Fine Arts, Feng flew to Baltimore to pursue a master’s of fine art in Illustration of Practice at the Maryland Institute College of Art.

Compared to the dreamy and delicate style of her earlier works, Feng’s work since arriving in the US has become concise and ironic.

In her 2013 series Flowers and Girls, Feng invites viewers into the soft inner world of modern females. While flowers may be a source of happiness for a young girl, a mature woman cares more about whether or not she is more gorgeous than the flowers.

In one of her editorial cartoons published in the New York Times, Feng depicts the dilemma of digital technology and the Internet. In the picture, PCs, TVs, smartphones and tablets surround a tall man who kneels on ground while attempting to deal with life and work at the same time. The ludicrous scene is the norm in the digital age, and Feng’s concise representation makes viewers question whether digital technology can really simplify people’s lives.

Feng also hoists up herself as the star of her creations. In “Fat Ladies,” Feng records her free life in the US and how she learned to accept and appreciate her own beauty as an overweight woman.

“I was mocked by lots of mean men because of my weight. I often wore men’s clothes to hide my low self-esteem. Now I’m confident enough to face my weight and use my works to tell other fat ladies that they can be gorgeous,” Feng says.

Finding her confidence may be Feng’s biggest change since living abroad. After graduating from MICA in Baltimore last year, Feng moved to New York to work as a freelance illustrator.

The competitive environment has put her through bouts of depression, but Feng has become a regular contributor to mainstream media since getting her first editorial cartoon published in Fast Company Magazine last August.

“Unlike China, where illustration is a low position, it seems everyone in New York loves illustrations. You can see them in advertisements, subways and on the covers of many novels,” she said.

This post originally appeared in Beijing Today.

Our friends at Beijing Today swing by now and then to introduce art and culture in the city.

Carousels, Ferris wheels and bumper cars are the characters of artist Huang Saifeng’s amusement-themed paintings. His style blends fairytale settings with the dreamy feel of fading memory to evoke powerful nostalgia.

For most people, amusement parks are associated with happiness and fun. But the lonely amusement parks Huang creates are hard to connect with such uplifting concepts. Even when a lone figure appears it is just a shot of his back. Carousels dominate his pictures – so much so that many viewers mistake his work for mere paintings of the rides.

Huang’s technique is primarily inspired by childhood regret. “Although most children have some memory of visiting an amusement park, for some reason I was never able to go,” Huang said. “Even though I can go any time I want today, the feeling is totally different from what a child would experience.”

He compares his choice of subjects to Michael Jackson’s decision to build a large, private amusement park when he became rich.

In preparation for the series, Huang listened to the song “Xuan Mu” by Faye Wang. “I was inspired. The lyrics are about a carousel. I think it fits my creation – the topic of fleeting time.”

Huang said the painting “So Close, So Far Away” (below) best captures his personal regret over lost experiences. He painted it after a sad meeting up with two former classmates.

“We hadn’t spoken in a long time – since graduation really – but when we got together we didn’t have much to say,” he said. When the three passed by an inflatable amusement park, Huang felt their awkward atmosphere was in sharp contrast to that of the happy children playing inside.

“The seated man is my portrait,” Huang said, pointing at the picture. “Silent and lonely, I’m waiting for my friends to come. Sadly, they may never arrive.”

This post originally appeared in Beijing Today.

Chinese social networking sites have been swamped with discussion of the latest scandalous topic: “Escort for Travel.” Purportedly the work of an 18-year-old woman, the posts advertise job openings for “temporary boyfriends” and include photos and videos of the woman sleeping with random men on her trips to Nanjing, Wuxi and Suzhou.

Sites that carried the story basked in the traffic brought by social media shares and angry comments lamenting the “moral deficiency of modern youth.”

But as with much Chinese news, the story was much deeper than it appeared on the surface.

Within days, the certified Sina Weibo account @Chuanmeidaguancha confirmed that the seemingly scandalous story was actually a viral soft advertisement for Youjia, a new social networking app.

“It’s not the first time a software maker chose to promote its app like this,” said Shushu, a blogger in Nanjing. “The similar ‘Backhoe Sex’ episode came only two weeks before.”

In that incident, police near Shanghai’s Putuo district supposedly received a call on October 13 from a man and a woman who had broken into a backhoe left at a construction site and locked themselves inside the cabin.

Three days later, The Paper released an investigative report that proved the story to be false. According to the report, neither the Public Security Subbureau in Putuo nor the Shanghai Public Security Bureau had ever logged such a call.

This shock approach to app marketing can trace its roots back to earlier this year, when the front pages of many sites dedicated their real estate to “Anti-World Cup” slogans and photos of barely clothed women and violent, drunken fans.

Following each report was a call to arms: “Support us by following us on Youjia.”

Vulgar Marketing Model

“Fake news like the Backhoe Sex story make good use of the public’s love of scandals,” said Jiang Lili, a reporter at CRI Online. “They are meticulously crafted to broadcast a product.”

But the rapid spread of such soft advertising indicates a bigger problem: news websites are putting their traffic before the authenticity of their content, Qiuyi Net said in an editorial.

According to an editorial on Kankan News, some media outlets that passed along the Escort for Travel story had a signed agreement with Youjia. On Sina, the story was filed under “Sponsored Content,” a section heading typically used for soft advertising.

The case of group purchase website 55tuan may be one of the most extreme examples.

55tuan cooperated with as many as three public relations firms to plant and publish fake news. In June 2011, the company spread fake news that it had received an investment of $200 million from Goldman Sachs. It was also caught pruning negative comments and hiring paid commentators with the help of its public relations agency.

The long-suspected facts were leaked by a former employee of one of the public relations agencies hired by 55tuan.

Kankan News said companies looking to market a product will assign their public relations specialists or contracted agencies to develop farcical or novel content engineered to appeal to the human psyche. Once the story is shaped, it is sent to cooperative media agencies for publication or broadcast.

But the real fuel that makes this approach possible is the paid commentators: the so-called “Water Army.”

“We offer tailored propaganda and promotion plans that can give you considerable media exposure. All you need to do is send us your press release and tell us your budget,” said Xiao Liu, a spokesman for an online marketing firm.

Ordinary promotion proposals cost about 15,000 yuan. “Bulletin boards and forums are popular and active, and those are the best places to strike a chord and encourage people to continue sharing the story on their own,” Liu said.

More than half of the content on commercial websites and forums is manipulated by paid commentators, according to data from the Beijing Network News Supervision Center.

The industry has given rise to a parallel service that handles Q&A platforms and QQ groups. “We publicize your information and post positive comments on the major platforms,” Liu said. “Presenting it from a third-party angle helps to sway more Internet readers.

“QQ group promotion is more like viral marketing. We post your soft advertisements on numbers of groups to meet your demand of exposure.”

The Water Army has invaded Weibo as well. “Our Weibo promotions focus on three aspects: fans, blog articles and event marketing hype. The last is the one most requested by our clients,” Liu said.

“We never ask about the authenticity or legality of our assignments,” said a Water Army poster who refused to be named. “We will write anything as long as we get paid.”

Crackdown on the Way

On October 28, the State Internet Information Office published an announcement demanding Youjia rectify its marketing and app store giants remove it from their catalogues. A few of the company’s leaders and public relations agencies are being investigated.

“The Internet is not a lawless playground,” said a spokesperson for the State Internet Information Office. “All Internet companies must abide by state laws and regulations. We will have a nationwide audit of instant messaging clients and apps soon.”

Lu Wei, director of the State Internet Information Office, said the office is formulating administrative measures designed to rein in the marketing of mobile app developers.

But in academic circles, the argument appears to be over the definition of vulgar marketing. “Chinese legislation about Internet hype is far behind, even with the most recent revision,” said Wang Bin, an associate professor at the Nankai University School of Law.

This post originally appeared in Beijing Today.

Our friends at Beijing Today swing by now and then to introduce art and culture in the city.

While most painters create their art using pen or brush, the avant-garde artist He Ling (@何玲Heling) uses medical syringes to bring his wild imaginings to life.

At his recent exhibition in Songzhuang Art District, the young artist displayed a series of mutant birds and beasts he created by injecting acrylic paints and dyes made from Chinese herbs into his canvas. The process resembles traditional embroidery in its delicacy.

Although He is a graduate of the Central Academy of Fine Arts, it’s not hard for the layperson to understand his unique artistic language. The combination of biological impossibilities with dreamy or nostalgic backgrounds creates an effect that is both terribly absurd and unusually familiar.

“Our ancestors and folk artisans expressed their understanding of the world – or their lack of understanding – using their imaginations,” He said. “Just look at the descriptions of some ‘species’ in the Shanhaijing,” a Qin Dynasty tome of myth.

“Modern people are rigid,” he said. “They think and behave according to their instructed rules and patterns. They have created a society that is spiritually divorced from natural inspiration.”

Through seemingly absurd images the young artist hopes to make viewers reflect on reality. In his work Yi Qin Tu, strange creatures such as bird-headed turtles, elephant-headed chickens and a combination of butterflies and bees call on viewers to consider pollution’s role in genetic mutation.

Another feature of He’s work is the comparison between human nature and animal instinct. Tong Wei Hu Sheng and Tong Wei Ma Qun depict the same theme – brutal cannibalism in the animal world – as well as more universal situations in human society.

“It is quite interesting to map human experiences onto the animals,” said Yang Wei, a local art critic. “Very often, when you compare a certain activity between human and animals, the former is much more absurd than the latter.”

He’s unique style comes more from experience than whimsy, said Duan Jun, vice president of White Box Gallery. Childhood images of mysterious and strange plants and animals stimulated He’s artistic impulse: the syringe enabled him to explore it.

He was born in 1981 in the remote mountains of Hunan province to three generations of village doctors. He spent most of his childhood in the family’s backyard clinic. Herbal medicine and old syringes were his toys.

“The pharmacy contained towering drawers full of exotic plants and other materials. Opening them was like being a little explorer. Some had dried leaves or colorful fruits. Some had roots or animal horns. Others were full of dead insects,” He said.

“It was a point of pride for me that I could find any medicine using its shape, color or smell when my mother assigned me to fetch something for a patient,” he said.

Apart from the playground of the pharmacy, various medical instruments were also He’s toys. Syringes were his favorite.

His sensitive blending of the natural and imaginary world has led China Culture Daily to term He’s avant-garde style “magical realism.”

But as a maverick and young artist, He tends to resist genre classification.

“Magical realism is a Latin American genre that had its heyday in the 1950s. Its historical context and expressive intent have no relationship with my work,” He said. “I am more concerned about whether my art can resonate with viewers than figuring out what I should label it.”

In addition to his needle paintings, He has also experimented with sculpture, performance and installation to express ideas and ask questions. He said he is looking for mediums that will allow him more chances for interaction rather than limiting himself to personal expression.

This post originally appeared in Beijing Today.

Our friends at Beijing Today swing by now and then to introduce art and culture in the city.

It’s hard to find anyone without an opinion about this city, be it a fear of pollution, heavy traffic or some other widely reported negative attribute.

But Beijing isn’t all bad.

Tasty snacks, magnificent architecture and a comparatively cosmopolitan environment are among the city’s selling points, which is what artist Tian Li attempts to capture in his work.

Tian’s paintings skip over human figures to focus on buildings. Majestic palaces, ancient city walls and narrow alleys dominate his canvas. Tian appears to love Beijing. Or to be more exact, he loves to paint Beijing.

Tian’s life experiences have greatly influenced his creative process. He followed his parents to Beijing from Liaoning province when he was 10 years old. Since then, he has spent most of his life in the city. After 50 years, he knows Beijing better than most natives.

His obsession comes at the cost of total exclusion of all other locations. “Art originates from life and should draw deeply on personal experience,” he said. An artist who plans to paint a city should live there for a long time to avoid missing its soul.

“I have traveled many beautiful places like Huangshan and Guilin. They are certainly amazing, but I’m not going to depict these places with the superficial eyes of a tourist,” he said.

It’s easy to find themes in Tian’s art. Reds and yellows – the colors of ancient palaces – dominate most of the pictures.

China regards red as a festive color and a symbol of dignity and luck. As early as 30,000 ago, ancient people began decorating their caves with red hues. After the Zhou Dynasty, Chinese palaces were mostly decorated with red.

As for the wide use of yellow, the color is tied to China’s search for its origins. Han civilization began in the Yellow River Valley by the loess plateau. Yellow has been the official color of imperial power and authority since the Han Dynasty: in feudal times it was reserved for use by the royal family.

Tian’s work is divided into block prints and oil paintings. Block prints make up most of his earlier work, though he has moved away from the medium due in part to its difficulty. Block printing is a medium of subtraction and requires the artist to start over completely to correct even minor mistakes, he said.

But the simple colors of block prints are perfectly suited to depicting Beijing’s hutongs – the antithesis of palace life. While the palace was a land of riches and luxury, the hutongs were humble dwellings associated with simplicity or poverty.

“Maybe in the future I will use wash painting to depict Beijing,” he said. Regardless of which medium he chooses next, it’s a safe bet that Tian’s sole subject matter will continue to be the city’s spirit.

This post originally appeared in Beijing Today.

Our friends at Beijing Today swing by now and then to introduce art and culture in the city.

If you haven’t made any plans for your Halloween night, consider a trip to one of Beijing’s haunted houses.

Not to be confused with the spooky amusement destinations that pop up throughout the US and Canada at this time of the year, these haunted houses are the sites of ancient murders and suicides.

Tales of wandering spirits, unusual sounds and paranormal activity have persisted for more than a decade at some of these locations…

Chaonei No. 81 (also pictured above)

Located on a crowded street in the heart of the city, Chaonei No. 81 is Beijing’s best known haunted house. Its recent fame comes from being the inspiration for Jingcheng No. 81 (The House That Never Dies), a 3-D thriller directed by Raymond Yip.

Creepy stories associated with the house make it one of the most popular destinations for Chinese thrill seekers.

Constructed in the late Qing Dynasty, the Baroque mansion was the private residence of a French railroad manger. During the Republican period the building was sold to a Kuomintang official who lived there with his mistress.

When the Kuomintang government fell in 1949, the man fled to Taiwan and left the woman behind. She quickly lost her mind and hanged herself in the luxurious home rather than face life alone in New China.

Despite its shabby state, Chaonei No. 81 hasn’t been incorporated into demolition or reconstruction plans and is currently in a state of disuse.

Location: 81 Chaoyangmen Nei Dajie, Dongcheng
Transport: Take Subway Lines 2 or 6 to Chaoyangmen Station. Follow Exit H.

Huguang Guild Hall

Built during the reign of the Jiaqing Emperor of the Qing Dynasty, Huguang Guild Hall was intended to be a reunion hall for businessmen and ministers from the provinces of Hunan and Hubei.

There are two horrible stories associated with the hall.

According to one version, the hall was the former residence of Zhang Juzheng, a famous reformer during the Ming Dynasty. After Zhang’s death, political opponents murdered his entire family. The only survivor was his 80-year-old mother.

Another version of the story claims that Huguang Guild Hall was built on an abandoned graveyard, causing many ferocious and angry ghosts to torment its inhabitants. People who lived nearby said they often heard cries and cursing from outside their home, but when they opened their doors there would be no one present.

The Huguang Guild is a spacious imperial-style courtyard. It has exquisite doors with carved tiles, fabulous gardens and an old theatrical stage sure to attract both history buffs and ghost seekers.

Location: 3 Hufang Lu, Luomashi Dajie, Xicheng
Transport: Take Subway Line 2 to Hepingmen Station. Follow Exit B. Transfer to Bus 7, 14 or 70 and get off at Hufang Lukou Nan.

Prince Li Mansion

Covering about 30 hectares (74 acres), the Prince Li Mansion has the largest number of rooms among princes’ mansions in the Forbidden City. As a symbol of authority and power, a natural sense of mystery led citizens to make many lurid tales.

A sad love story associated with the mansion is one of the most famous. After studying abroad in France, Princess Lanxin, the daughter of Prince Li, fell in love with the no-name actor Feng Yuecong. But the romance fell apart when Feng’s friend snitched on their secret relationship. As a result, Feng was poisoned and sent to prison.

After being discharged, Feng learned danxian, a single-string fiddle, and played outside the mansion. Legend has it that his ghost became a strong wind that has haunted the Prince Li Mansion ever since.

Location: 9 Xichenggen Nan Jie, Xicheng
Transport: Take Subway Line 4 to Lingjing Hutong. Follow Exit D.

Xiaoshihu Hutong No. 33

Built in 1779, Xiaoshihu Hutong No. 33 was the property of Aisin-Gioro Miande, the grandson of the Qianlong Emperor.

Ji Xiaolan, a famous writer and administrator, wrote that the house has a long history and it is “quite normal” to encounter ghosts within.

The accounts of its neighbors seem to support Ji’s words. Many have reported hearing the voice of a woman reading poetry or playing the guzheng.

At one time, Xiaoshihu Hutong No. 33 was adapted into an academy where civil officials would gather to compile books and share their expertise. One of the occupants was Cao Xueqin, who lived for several years while completing the rough draft of his Dream of the Red Chamber.

Location: 9 Xihuangchenggen Nan Jie, Xicheng
Transport: Take the Subway Lines 1 or 4 to Xidan. Follow Exit B.

This post originally appeared in Beijing Today.

Our friends at Beijing Today swing by now and then to introduce art and culture in the city.

Most people might not give Chinese posters a second thought, but Wang Yuqing has dedicated himself to collecting and studying them as historical records.

Often dismissed as propaganda, the posters reveal much about the social culture, economy and politics of modern Chinese history.

Archive of the Ages

Wang Yuqing maintains one of the largest collections of Chinese posters printed between 1912 and 1975, a staggering collection which offers insights into Old Shanghai life and the positive energy that followed the founding of New China.

His posters from Old Shanghai represent one of the first appearances of popular art in China. When the Qing Dynasty was forced to open Shanghai as a treaty port after the first Opium War (1840-1842), the city began modernizing at a breakneck pace.

The calendar pictures were originally created as advertisements for foreign commodities. Most feature beautiful young models with dates marked in both the Chinese and Gregorian calendars. The remainder of the poster area is used to introduce products.

Drawn by attractive young women, Shanghai’s residents embraced the calendars and quickly spread them to Chinese communities abroad.

The style, which depicts women with egg-white skin, was the invention of Chinese painter Zheng Mantuo. In 1914, Zheng applied watercolor painting techniques to create Wan Zhuang Tu, the first calendar picture. From then on, the brushwork was copied to develop more posters.

As the market evolved, the advertisements changed. Images of happy families replaced charming ladies in the Republican era. Eventually, the style faded from popularity and the painting techniques were lost, Wang said.

In the new era, the Old Shanghai calendars gave way to political posters with exaggerated features. In Huasheng Chuang, a fat boy is seen swinging on a massive peanut as a sign of agricultural abundance.

During the Great Leap Forward, the posters shifted from showing blissful liberated families to dependable workers and farmers.

Fading History

For various reasons, well preserved original posters are hard to come by. Most sold in the markets are modern fakes or copies that lose the stories that gave the propaganda context, Wang said.

To share his collection and the history behind the art, Wang held an exhibition at Beijing Dezi Art Center in June and July.

“At present, the price of these posters is not even close to their real value. I think one day the world will recognize their real value,” he said. As an accurate record of historical attitudes rather than circumstances, the posters represent an element that is often lost in historical studies.

Compiled over the last 24 years, Wang’s collection of nearly 4,000 posters offers a rare bridge to China’s recent past.

This post originally appeared in Beijing Today.

Update, 7:26 pm: we got ahold of more posters:

Our friends at Beijing Today swing by now and then to introduce art and culture in the city.

Artists and writers seeking the pinnacle of Chinese civilization often turn to the Tang Dynasty, an era of openness and innovation credited with fostering some of the finest art and poetry in the history of Han civilization.

It’s no surprise that such an amazing era would provide similar inspiration to Xu Songbo, a professor at the Tianjin Academy of Fine Arts, who attempts to capture the Tang spirit in his breathtaking oil compositions. They are collected in Tang Feng, his exhibition open until this Thursday at New Millennium Gallery in 798 Art District.

Xu focuses on the Tang Dynasty’s obsession with horsemanship and the hunt. Lin Yuan Ta Ge Tu depicts a well-dressed rider taking in the northern scenery. In Xia Ke Xing, a mounted archer searches for prey as his horse charges ahead.

Few creatures other than horses and humans make an appearance in Xu’s works. “I grew up in the 70s, and our generation had comic books instead of cartoons. Most of the comics told the stories of ancient dynasties, and the horse was the finest vehicle of the era,” he said. “Horses have been burned into my mind since childhood.”

But Xu’s works show as much of his own affinity for equines as the noble animal’s status in Chinese culture.

The horse arrived in China with the charioteers of the Shang dynasty (1600-1046 BC). By 400 BC, they had become a symbol of prestige in addition to a tool of warfare.

Judging by idiomatic expressions, the horse is second only to the dragon among China’s beloved animals. A willful person is often compared to “having the vigor of a dragon or a horse,” and horses are said to pave the way to success. Some scholars even judge the success of ancient dynasties by the development of their horse culture.

“If we evaluate Tang by such criteria, it would be the heyday of the nation,” Xu said.

Tang rulers embraced the horse like no other Han-founded dynasty. The majority of cultural relics like the Six Steeds of the Zhao Mausoleum and Tri-color Horse prove that argument. Tang’s equine obsession has its roots in the Xianbei, an ancient group of Mongolic nomads who once dominated today’s eastern Mongolia, Inner Mongolia and Northeast China. Historical records show that the founders of Tang were Han Chinese generals who had been in the employ of the Xianbei state. As military men experienced in nomadic warfare, they brought the love of the horse to the imperial court.

Tang was one of the greatest powers in the world during its era, annexing many of its neighboring states and maintaining diplomatic relations with South and West Asian powers, the Abbasid Caliphate and a handful of European nations. For tributary states in the Tarim Basin or Transoxiana, fine steeds were a customary gift for the court.

The Tang Dynasty may have been the most cosmopolitan era in China history. Long noted for its religious tolerance and comparatively free exchange of cultures, Tang’s pluralism is something Xu attempts to reflect in his paintings. In Qiu Feng Jin, several of the men are depicted in the costume of other ethnic groups and wielding distinct weapons.

“As an artist, Xu uses positive energy to recast the zeitgeist of bygone eras in the perspective of modern people,” said Zhang Siyong, the curator. Xu previously explored traditional culture in his Chang Feng and Dao Wen series.

“When I was a little boy, the poems my teacher taught gave me an obscure impression about Tang,” Xu said. “I started to understand it better when painting comic books in university.” He continued his studies in the Mural Painting Department of the Central Academy of Fine Art.

But Xu’s attempt to recapture the spirit of Tang Dynasty is the result of an uncomfortable fact: Chinese culture is wandering further and further from its roots. Although many now recognize the importance of preserving China’s cultural roots, few take any meaningful action to preserve them.

Xu says Han costume fans and students of literature only preserve the shell of Chinese tradition while losing sight of its spirit. From his point of view, the spirit of traditional culture can be summed up as one of confidence, freedom, tolerance, wisdom, romance and initiative.

“It will take the effort of several generations to find our roots – the spirit of traditional culture,” Xu said.

New Millennium Gallery

Through October 16
Room 3818, 798 Art District, Jiuxianqiao Lu, Chaoyang
(010) 6432 4122
Free

This post originally appeared in Beijing Today.

Our friends at Beijing Today swing by now and then to introduce art and culture in the city.

Tao Na is aggressively trying to create a name for herself in the world of design. She is famous for using bricks, lights and pixel designs to craft outstanding mosaics.

Since finishing her degree in architecture at the Central Academy of Fine Arts in 2004, Tao has won a number of international design contests.

Her walls are decorated with celebrity portraits created in ceramic tile mosaic. Among the famous faces are Elizabeth Taylor, Barack Obama and Vladimir Putin.

Tao focuses on scenes of life, such as family gatherings and lovers sharing a kiss. At the opening of her solo exhibition, she used laser lights to create a giant diamond in the space of the exhibition hall.

Her artistic language is one that will be familiar to many young Chinese, and much of the context comes from a careful understanding of visitor traffic through the exhibition space.

In the painting section, her series titled “Beautiful World” interacts with viewers using abstract and concrete language. The solo exhibition also includes “Tian Jue,” one of her works exhibited at the Venice Biennale to much acclaim.

Tao labels herself as a “sincere visual art worker.” Like Wang Yin, she is trying to create beautiful worlds in her mind.

In preparing for this exhibition, Tao and her curator Zhao Li collected her thoughts from 2008 to 2014 and selected works to best represent the time span. Arranged thusly, viewers can get some clue what Tao Na might be planning next.

The exhibition at SZ Art Center is Tao’s third solo display since 2000. Her work has appeared in more than 60 group exhibitions around the world, won seven domestic awards and 13 Chinese patents. Her work has been displayed at the Contemporary Art Center of Europe, Chinese Contemporary Art Center, Museum in Taizhong (Taiwan Island), the Venice Biennale, MOMA in Moscow and Asia Art Museum in Paris.

SZ Art Center

798 Art Zone, Jiuxianqiao Lu, No2-4, Chaoyang District
Through July 5
(010) 5978 9213
szartcenter.com

This post originally appeared in Beijing Today.

Our friends at Beijing Today swing by now and then to introduce art and culture in the city.

The nature of charity in China is changing. In the last decade, both international organizations and domestic groups have shifted from relying on donation drives to providing more complex cultural services to meet the specific needs of disadvantaged groups.

But finding the right way to go about charitable projects remains a tough question for many.

At a recent performance by Musethica, the group’s founder, Avri Levitan, spoke to the children of migrant workers at Chaoyang Banbidian Elementary about how theory and technique are not the way to go about mastering music. The education project encourages music learners to participate in charitable performances to give music to people who have few chances to experience it.

Musethica has been providing free concerts to orphanages, children’s education centers and nursing houses around the world. Its Beijing trip was supported by the China National Children’s Center, Youth League Committee of Chaoyang, the Isreali embassy and other organizations.

Most of the students were curious about the instruments and the performers. After performing five pieces, Levitan invited the children to play his violin. Yang Dongming, a 9-year-old student, said the performance was very different from most of the school’s events. Having studied keyboard, Yang said Levitan’s ideas were very different from his teachers’. “I always focused on theory and did whatever the teachers told me to do. I should have spent more time thinking about the meaning of what I was playing,” he said.

Charitable projects are increasingly common in China, although most focus on donating material goods to impoverished communities. Last month, students from Beijing’s Shijia Elementary saved money to send paper and notebooks to students at the city’s Xiao Tian’e Elementary School.

But art and culture performances are becoming a popular alternative as a way to open the minds of disadvantaged children and inspire them to strive for their own success. Most are organized or supported by the local government or educators.

Efficient and successful charity work depends on providing what the recipients need: not what the donor thinks or feels is necessary. Musethica provides art education to students too poor to afford tuition while the students at Shijia Elementary provided material goods their peers struggled to purchase. “Poor children or children with mental diseases need support, not pity,” said Professor Xu Guangxing, a child psychologist. “Seeing faces of pity at a charity event will only reinforce their powerlessness, whereas smiles and equal treatment can make them grow more confident.”

Training courses are also important. Yang Lan, a famous senior media practitioner, said charitable events require professional management knowledge and experience. “Sun Culture Foundation, Peking University and Harvard University have been cooperating to develop charitable training courses to give the students better access to knowledge and skills,” she said.

Whether the group behind a charity work is from home or abroad, charity organizers must be committed to helping solve real problems rather than flaunting their “kindness.”

Local lawyer Zhang Qihuai studied the early years of Chinese charity – specifically a case where charitable works became commercialized in Hangzhou, Zhejiang province. Zhang said charities that act in their own interests can easily find themselves in legal trouble.

Lack of legal knowledge and social responsibility is the main cause of charities going bad.

Xu Guangxing also said handing money to poor children only reinforces their powerlessness. Charity must come from respect, he said, and it must come regularly.

This post originally appeared in Beijing Today.

Our friends at Beijing Today swing by now and then to introduce art and culture in the city.

As the first Chinese artist to capture the dimensional style of Paul Cézanne (1839-1909), Pan Hao uses planes of color and small brushstrokes to build exceedingly complex images.

Pan began his art education at the Guangzhou Academy of Fine Arts, graduating in 1987. He spent the next decade continuing his studies at Tama Art University in Japan.

After a year of studying oil painting in Europe, Pan returned to China. In 2003, he enrolled as a PhD candidate in the Central Academy of Fine Arts and stayed on at the academy to teach after graduating.

Drawing on his years abroad, Pan has created a number of oil paintings describing daily life in the urban cities of Japan and Europe. Most of his paintings are held by local museums and foundations.

Early in his career, Pan painted spring, summer and autumn scenery that was free of people. But as the years went on, he began adding crowds, sharp lines and sketches of bus or subway stations.

Soon after, Pan turned his attention to individual shoppers or workers: their families, their joy and their happiness. His most successful works include “Mother and Her Children,” “Naughty Boys” and “Seeking Happiness.”

“Pan Hao has clear control over the three-dimensional character of his work,” said Jia Fangzhou, curator of Pan’s solo exhibition. “He is a painter who pays careful attention to the shape and appearance of the characters in his works.”

Q&A with Pan Hao

What helps you give your characters such rich texture?

I used to paint the seasons, but gradually I felt that approach would lead me to a dead end in oil painting. In Japan, we had strict classes and learned the style of impressionist artist Paul Cézanne.

So that’s the approach I still follow today, and it’s the style I will teach my students since it is so good for creating detailed characters.

Do you reject other painting styles?

I wouldn’t say that. I’ve learned many different styles and am always prepared to try more.

How can you spare time to paint while teaching?

You can always make time for anything you truly enjoy: time management is an essential life skill. That’s something I always try to tell my students.

Art Bridge Gallery

D09-1, 78 Art District, Jiuxianqiao Road, Chaoyang District
Through June 20
(010) 6433 1798 or 13701085886

This post originally appeared in Beijing Today.

Our friends at Beijing Today swing by now and then to introduce art and culture in the city.

If China’s contemporary art market has one fatal fault, it is an obsession with cultivating and trading stars.

Artists born in the 1960s have become darlings of the market, producing some of the most expensive works traded at auction houses anywhere in the world.

But the next generation, born in the 1970s, has very different goals for creation and social recognition. Most use their skills to express an attitude or convey their artistic perspective to the public in plain language.

Among their creations is the “new ink” movement of Chinese contemporary art. Though the definition of this category is still evolving, for now it appears shaped by artists experimenting with new ways to imbue traditional painting with deeper artistic meaning.

Tan Jun is one of the artists most associated with the movement. Since graduating from college in 1993, Tan has made exceptional strides in updating the nature of traditional ink and imbuing his paintings with strong contemporary qualities. His unique style comes from rich personal experience, superior brush skills and an ongoing search for the connections between all things.

After graduating, Tan began working as a teacher. Seeking to improve on existing styles, he enrolled in the Central Academy of Fine Arts in 2002. After finding his artistic identity, he emerged in 2005 as a professional freelance artist.

Tan spends much of his time studying different artistic styles and the spiritual contexts of traditional art, as well as the historical events that shape the essence of the overall contemporary movement.

Digesting it all, he seeks out contrasts between tradition and modernity and the world’s forms of expression. His content experiments with different artistic languages as he explores the spiritual world of ink.

Q&A With Tan Jun

BT: How do you discover the subjects for your work?

TAN: There are a lot of ways to approach a painting. I like to use photography as a reference. Depth of field can serve to separate or wipe out the levels and distance in an object, causing viewers to zero in a particular portion of the image. My eyes are my lens, focusing on one point and letting everything else fade away. When you look at the world with selective focus, you’ll find the atmosphere and picture appear naturally. Once you make a habit of it, it’s easy to extract a specific image from the complicated world.

BT: What kinds of people or things are exciting or shocking? That inspire you to create?

TAN: When there is conflict, there is a spark. Because each person has his own system of values and applies them to limited knowledge, conflicts are frequent and inevitable. They can arise between people and people, people and objects and even within ourselves. Sometimes, I spend two to three years turning a rough sketch into a painting. The span allows for my own growth and change: one where I can find a stronger emotional connection to touch off the big sparks that will make it a real painting in my mind.

BT: If you are continually searching for these sparks, how does the delay affect your creative system?

TAN: I am always building a spiritual world that belongs to myself. Part of me seeks knowledge that can be recognized and broadcast through objects, pictures, characters and images. I’ve mastered some techniques that give me many ways to convey emotion. I hone my intuition because it makes me feel the world is more detailed, sensitive and rich. As my skills improve, I return to search for more links between the spiritual and emotional worlds.

This post originally appeared in Beijing Today.