0:00:03 > 0:00:07I think of Chinese art as a single great scroll of calligraphy,
0:00:07 > 0:00:10written by many hands, telling the story
0:00:10 > 0:00:14of a 4,000-year-old civilisation's fears and hopes.
0:00:16 > 0:00:19At first, there was art for the dead,
0:00:19 > 0:00:22created to appease the wrath of the gods,
0:00:22 > 0:00:25to take control of the afterlife
0:00:25 > 0:00:28or offer consolation through prayer.
0:00:30 > 0:00:32Then there was the art of the living -
0:00:32 > 0:00:34the art of scholars,
0:00:34 > 0:00:36who immersed themselves in nature,
0:00:36 > 0:00:41of emperors with an insatiable thirst for exquisite objects,
0:00:41 > 0:00:45or for breathtaking architecture, gateway to the divine.
0:00:47 > 0:00:52And finally, an art born out of China's contact with the West -
0:00:52 > 0:00:56brilliant hybrids, but also portents of disaster,
0:00:56 > 0:01:00a humbling end to 2,000 years of imperial power.
0:01:04 > 0:01:07The art that emerged from the ruins was one of revolution and rebirth,
0:01:07 > 0:01:11but accompanied too by shattering destruction.
0:01:12 > 0:01:15And now, China has risen again,
0:01:15 > 0:01:17and a new generation of artists
0:01:17 > 0:01:21are striving to give it a shape and a meaning.
0:01:21 > 0:01:24We've taken away so much, so fast,
0:01:24 > 0:01:27that we don't even remember what we had before.
0:01:27 > 0:01:30Have they been crushed by the oppression of the past?
0:01:30 > 0:01:33Or have they found a way to breathe new life
0:01:33 > 0:01:36into China's ancient traditions?
0:01:55 > 0:01:59Modern China - it can be a bewildering place.
0:01:59 > 0:02:04Gleaming high-rise buildings next to wooden shacks.
0:02:04 > 0:02:07McDonald's next to street concessions
0:02:07 > 0:02:10selling bowls of steaming noodles.
0:02:10 > 0:02:12An uneasy blend of East and West.
0:02:12 > 0:02:17What can be more uneasy than a communist capitalist state?
0:02:17 > 0:02:20But if you want to understand the history
0:02:20 > 0:02:22of China's relationship with the West,
0:02:22 > 0:02:25you have to turn the clock back some 400 years
0:02:25 > 0:02:30to the arrival of China's last great imperial dynasty -
0:02:30 > 0:02:31the Qing.
0:02:36 > 0:02:37The Qing were foreigners,
0:02:37 > 0:02:40breaching the Great Wall from their homeland of Manchuria,
0:02:40 > 0:02:42northeast of China.
0:02:42 > 0:02:46They formed the last of China's great dynasties,
0:02:46 > 0:02:49but never completely forgot their outsider origins.
0:02:50 > 0:02:52Unlike their predecessors, the Ming,
0:02:52 > 0:02:56whose great symbol was the Great Wall of China,
0:02:56 > 0:02:58who were enclosed, inward-looking,
0:02:58 > 0:03:01the Qing looked outwards.
0:03:01 > 0:03:05They opened Chinese culture up to the outside world
0:03:05 > 0:03:07and, above all, to the West.
0:03:13 > 0:03:16Qing cultural policy was two-pronged -
0:03:16 > 0:03:18you might say two-faced.
0:03:18 > 0:03:20To woo their new subjects,
0:03:20 > 0:03:23they commissioned traditional Chinese art,
0:03:23 > 0:03:27expanding the Forbidden City and adding to its collections.
0:03:27 > 0:03:31But at the same time, they introduced art so foreign,
0:03:31 > 0:03:33it seemed positively alien.
0:03:39 > 0:03:43When we're talking about the influence of the West on China,
0:03:43 > 0:03:46this really is "X marks the spot."
0:03:46 > 0:03:47It all began here,
0:03:47 > 0:03:51because this was the very first Western-European settlement
0:03:51 > 0:03:56in the heart of China's capital city
0:03:56 > 0:03:59and this marks the centre of it -
0:03:59 > 0:04:01it's a Catholic cathedral.
0:04:01 > 0:04:05The Jesuits were allowed to settle here
0:04:05 > 0:04:07and to preach the Word of God
0:04:07 > 0:04:10by the Qing emperors.
0:04:10 > 0:04:12But it was a deal -
0:04:12 > 0:04:15what the emperors wanted in return was Western science,
0:04:15 > 0:04:17Western technology, Western inventions
0:04:17 > 0:04:20and, perhaps above all, Western art.
0:04:20 > 0:04:24And one traveller from Europe gave them that more than any other.
0:04:24 > 0:04:28His name was Giuseppe Castiglione
0:04:28 > 0:04:32and he, almost single-handedly, changed the face of Chinese art.
0:04:38 > 0:04:41Castiglione was by no means the only Westerner
0:04:41 > 0:04:44to come to China from the Catholic south of Europe,
0:04:44 > 0:04:47but he was by far the most influential.
0:04:51 > 0:04:53Before he arrived under the Ming,
0:04:53 > 0:04:57Chinese court art had continued in a traditional style.
0:04:58 > 0:05:01Exquisite, but unadventurous.
0:05:06 > 0:05:09Castiglione, with his Western innovations,
0:05:09 > 0:05:11shook up this frozen world.
0:05:12 > 0:05:16His earliest known work is a scroll of 1723
0:05:16 > 0:05:19called Accumulating Fortunes.
0:05:21 > 0:05:23On a background of imperial gold,
0:05:23 > 0:05:27Castiglione has modelled his bouquet in light and shade,
0:05:27 > 0:05:30has used bright, living colours for the blooms,
0:05:30 > 0:05:33and painted the vase in perspective -
0:05:33 > 0:05:36techniques familiar in Europe since the Renaissance,
0:05:36 > 0:05:37but unknown in China.
0:05:42 > 0:05:44The symbolism of the flowers was ancient.
0:05:44 > 0:05:48Corn and lotus blossom for fertility and good fortune.
0:05:50 > 0:05:52Peonies, national symbol of China.
0:05:54 > 0:05:57But this Western realism was startlingly new.
0:06:00 > 0:06:03Accumulating Fortunes beguiled the emperor
0:06:03 > 0:06:04and under his patronage,
0:06:04 > 0:06:06Castiglione thrived.
0:06:10 > 0:06:13Castiglione is hardly a household name in the West,
0:06:13 > 0:06:18but in China, as Lang Shining, he is venerated as a master
0:06:18 > 0:06:20and his paintings are national treasures.
0:06:26 > 0:06:30The measures taken to protect this work of art may seem extreme,
0:06:30 > 0:06:35but this 1728 scroll, 100 Horses In A Landscape,
0:06:35 > 0:06:37is considered his masterpiece.
0:06:38 > 0:06:39After you.
0:06:40 > 0:06:42The painting's got security guards.
0:06:42 > 0:06:45I've never seen a painting with security guards before.
0:06:46 > 0:06:49- So I have to put on a mask?- Yes.
0:06:50 > 0:06:51OK.
0:06:52 > 0:06:56- Like this?- Yes. Great.
0:06:56 > 0:06:57Oh, great, thank you.
0:06:57 > 0:06:59THEY LAUGH
0:06:59 > 0:07:00How am I supposed to work?
0:07:03 > 0:07:05A bigger one?
0:07:05 > 0:07:06Oh, thank you.
0:07:06 > 0:07:08So, I've got... It wasn't...
0:07:08 > 0:07:10I know I've got a big mouth, but..
0:07:12 > 0:07:13Wow!
0:07:15 > 0:07:17I should explain the symbolism.
0:07:17 > 0:07:20The symbolism of the painting is that the horse
0:07:20 > 0:07:24stands for talent, a man of talent
0:07:24 > 0:07:28and the landscape stands for China under the Qing.
0:07:28 > 0:07:31So what the painting expresses as a whole
0:07:31 > 0:07:35is the notion that China under the Qing dynasty is full of talent,
0:07:35 > 0:07:42full of celebrated, clever, gifted individuals.
0:07:42 > 0:07:44This one is especially interesting
0:07:44 > 0:07:47- because he is so skinny.- Yeah.
0:07:47 > 0:07:51Skinny horse means something, that they are very...
0:07:51 > 0:07:52SHE SPEAKS IN OWN LANGUAGE
0:07:52 > 0:07:57How to say...? They will not obey to the authority.
0:07:57 > 0:08:01He is just looking at other horses, and...
0:08:01 > 0:08:03"I don't want to join you",
0:08:03 > 0:08:07but in the last part, he joined them.
0:08:07 > 0:08:11That's fantastic - which symbolises the notion that, under the Qing,
0:08:11 > 0:08:14even the rebellious talented will come into the imperial fold.
0:08:14 > 0:08:18So it's a great celebration of the emperor's power.
0:08:18 > 0:08:20- Yes, exactly.- Fantastic.
0:08:24 > 0:08:27The horsemen represent the officials of the Qing court,
0:08:27 > 0:08:30tenderly caring for their happy beasts -
0:08:30 > 0:08:31the Qing's loyal subjects.
0:08:33 > 0:08:35This is brilliant propaganda.
0:08:36 > 0:08:40The painting is over 25 feet long
0:08:40 > 0:08:44and its scale drives home the strong, clear message.
0:08:45 > 0:08:46It's wonderful, isn't it?
0:08:46 > 0:08:51Because you can see Castiglione has looked at Chinese painting.
0:08:51 > 0:08:54- He's looked at the imperial collection, I imagine.- Yes.
0:08:54 > 0:08:58Here, this remind me of Guo Xi, and here, he's got the mists
0:08:58 > 0:09:02- that represent the chi, the energy, of the landscape.- Yes.
0:09:02 > 0:09:08My understanding is that he could have put more shadow,
0:09:08 > 0:09:12but that the Chinese found shadows in painting rather disconcerting,
0:09:12 > 0:09:14so he included shadow to allow
0:09:14 > 0:09:18- a sufficient Western amount of modelling...- Yeah.
0:09:18 > 0:09:21..but then kept it to a minimum,
0:09:21 > 0:09:24not to confuse the Chinese sense of taste.
0:09:24 > 0:09:27But it's absolutely beautiful.
0:09:30 > 0:09:34Castiglione served three different Qing emperors,
0:09:34 > 0:09:38the last of whom came to the throne in 1735 -
0:09:38 > 0:09:40the charismatic Qianlong.
0:09:42 > 0:09:45Castiglione painted his portrait on horseback,
0:09:45 > 0:09:48harking back to the great equestrian portraits
0:09:48 > 0:09:50of European Baroque painting.
0:09:51 > 0:09:55Never before had a Chinese ruler looked down his nose at his people
0:09:55 > 0:09:57quite so convincingly.
0:10:02 > 0:10:06Qianlong would reign until the end of the 18th century.
0:10:06 > 0:10:09Under him, China enjoyed peace, stability
0:10:09 > 0:10:12and agricultural abundance.
0:10:12 > 0:10:14The population grew rapidly.
0:10:20 > 0:10:24China had never had it so good and to congratulate himself,
0:10:24 > 0:10:28Qianlong commissioned one of the most elaborate scroll paintings
0:10:28 > 0:10:30in the history of Chinese art.
0:10:30 > 0:10:34Completed 1759, it's called Prosperous Suzhou.
0:10:36 > 0:10:39This is what the richest town in China looked like
0:10:39 > 0:10:43when Samuel Johnson was out and about in London.
0:10:45 > 0:10:50The painting includes 12,000 figures and 260 shops -
0:10:50 > 0:10:53this is the land of consumer durables,
0:10:53 > 0:10:55the land of prosperity.
0:10:55 > 0:10:57There are tobacco shops, wine shops,
0:10:57 > 0:10:59cotton shops, silk shops,
0:10:59 > 0:11:02garden supply shops - you-name-it shops.
0:11:02 > 0:11:08Qianlong was very, very proud of how wealthy his China was.
0:11:08 > 0:11:13He's competing with the famous Song emperor Huizong,
0:11:13 > 0:11:15who'd commissioned the Qingming scroll,
0:11:15 > 0:11:17China's most famous painting -
0:11:17 > 0:11:21a depiction of wealthy, prosperous Kaifeng back in the Middle Ages.
0:11:22 > 0:11:26He's employed an entire team of artists,
0:11:26 > 0:11:32whom it took three years to create this 30-metre scroll.
0:11:32 > 0:11:35It's a truly extraordinary object.
0:11:35 > 0:11:38What it has to say is, basically,
0:11:38 > 0:11:42"We are as rich as we have ever been."
0:11:44 > 0:11:46Not so much the Qing dynasty
0:11:46 > 0:11:48as the "Ka-ching!" dynasty.
0:11:53 > 0:11:56Qianlong saw himself as the rightful heir to China
0:11:56 > 0:11:58and its most precious traditions.
0:11:58 > 0:12:00The transformation of the Qing
0:12:00 > 0:12:03from foreign invaders into Chinese rulers
0:12:03 > 0:12:04was complete.
0:12:06 > 0:12:09Qianlong's vast wealth also enabled him
0:12:09 > 0:12:14to pursue a new love of all things Western on a grand scale.
0:12:14 > 0:12:17He embraced plans for a European-style quarter
0:12:17 > 0:12:20within the Qing's vast Summer Palace estate
0:12:20 > 0:12:21on the outskirts of Beijing.
0:12:23 > 0:12:27Drawn up by the increasingly influential Castiglione,
0:12:27 > 0:12:31ten new European-style palaces would occupy a new garden
0:12:31 > 0:12:34within the 800 acres
0:12:34 > 0:12:38previously dominated by Chinese wooden architecture.
0:12:49 > 0:12:52Little remains, but the drawings reveal stone pavilions
0:12:52 > 0:12:57of a dazzling, Frenchified, Rococo elegance.
0:12:57 > 0:13:00The effect must have been surprising -
0:13:00 > 0:13:02like seeing Marie Antoinette in China.
0:13:10 > 0:13:13The one surviving remnant of the great Summer Palace
0:13:13 > 0:13:18is the maze and, in many ways, it's a perfect symbol
0:13:18 > 0:13:20of the Qing's love
0:13:20 > 0:13:25of complexity, intricacy, foreign styles, foreign games.
0:13:28 > 0:13:31As Emperor Qianlong's reign continued,
0:13:31 > 0:13:33his passion for art became an obsession
0:13:33 > 0:13:37and the country began falling behind in science and technology.
0:13:40 > 0:13:43Emperor Qianlong loved art -
0:13:43 > 0:13:46in fact, he collected and commissioned so much of it
0:13:46 > 0:13:51that it is said if you laid his collection end to end,
0:13:51 > 0:13:56it would take ten years just simply to walk past it.
0:14:03 > 0:14:07It wasn't enough for Qianlong to love art and collect it.
0:14:07 > 0:14:11He wanted the world to know forever just how much he loved it.
0:14:12 > 0:14:15He didn't merely, as emperors in the past had done,
0:14:15 > 0:14:18put his own seal on his favourite pieces -
0:14:18 > 0:14:21he put his seal plus a word of commendation.
0:14:22 > 0:14:24"Sublime." "Marvellous."
0:14:24 > 0:14:26"I really like this one."
0:14:31 > 0:14:36For me, the ultimate example of his obsessive collectamania is this -
0:14:36 > 0:14:38the box for the man who has to collect
0:14:38 > 0:14:40absolutely everything in the world.
0:14:40 > 0:14:42Well, that's my name for it.
0:14:42 > 0:14:47The museum label calls it "curio box with the motif of dragons."
0:14:49 > 0:14:52Open it up, and you find a miniaturised version
0:14:52 > 0:14:55of Qianlong's favourite things from his collection.
0:14:57 > 0:15:00It's like a doll's house version of his universe.
0:15:01 > 0:15:03Onyx.
0:15:03 > 0:15:05Porcelain.
0:15:05 > 0:15:09Knotted strings carved from stone.
0:15:09 > 0:15:11Curious religious sculptures.
0:15:11 > 0:15:14A bronze chicken.
0:15:14 > 0:15:16You name it, it's all here.
0:15:19 > 0:15:22Qianlong even collected himself -
0:15:22 > 0:15:24well, he collected volumes of his own poetry,
0:15:24 > 0:15:27each with a frontispiece portrait,
0:15:27 > 0:15:30slowly ageing, rather like Dorian Grey,
0:15:30 > 0:15:33from image to image.
0:15:41 > 0:15:48If I had to choose a single object to epitomise Qing taste,
0:15:48 > 0:15:49it would be this one.
0:15:49 > 0:15:54A Qing vase, commissioned by Emperor Qianlong himself,
0:15:54 > 0:15:57from the imperial kilns.
0:15:57 > 0:15:59You have got lattice-work,
0:15:59 > 0:16:03embellished disks attached to the sides,
0:16:03 > 0:16:06you've got these fronds, multicoloured,
0:16:06 > 0:16:08climbing up the spout.
0:16:09 > 0:16:13Such a contrast with Chinese porcelain from earlier dynasties.
0:16:13 > 0:16:19Think back to the aching simplicity of Song dynasty Ru ware.
0:16:23 > 0:16:29This is the Chinese ceramic equivalent of French Rococo -
0:16:29 > 0:16:35both are the styles of frivolity, decadence, overconsumption.
0:16:35 > 0:16:39It is the style that perfectly represents
0:16:39 > 0:16:43the pride that comes before a fall.
0:16:47 > 0:16:50Qianlong is honoured in buzzing virtual reality
0:16:50 > 0:16:52here at the National Palace Museum in Taipei.
0:16:54 > 0:16:56There's even a cartoon hologram you can queue up
0:16:56 > 0:16:58to have your photograph taken with.
0:17:01 > 0:17:03There's something apt about enthroning him
0:17:03 > 0:17:06in this flickering fantasy land.
0:17:06 > 0:17:09He was a man in thrall to the fantasy of his own omnipotence.
0:17:10 > 0:17:13"Mine is a celestial dynasty",
0:17:13 > 0:17:15he wrote to King George III of England,
0:17:15 > 0:17:19"my palace, the centre around which the globe revolves."
0:17:21 > 0:17:24In truth, Qianlong took his eye off the globe -
0:17:24 > 0:17:27a great collector of Western art,
0:17:27 > 0:17:29he didn't realise it was Western science
0:17:29 > 0:17:31that was changing the world.
0:17:32 > 0:17:35So while Europe had the Industrial Revolution,
0:17:35 > 0:17:38new technology, new weapons,
0:17:38 > 0:17:40the newest thing in Qianlong's China
0:17:40 > 0:17:43was a collection of fragile novelties.
0:17:47 > 0:17:50When he waved his last goodbye in 1799,
0:17:50 > 0:17:53he left China ill-equipped for the new century.
0:18:09 > 0:18:11A particular thorn in China's side
0:18:11 > 0:18:15would be the people of a tiny, far-away maritime nation.
0:18:15 > 0:18:18Englishmen in unfamiliar woollen clothing
0:18:18 > 0:18:21had began arriving in numbers in the mid-18th century.
0:18:25 > 0:18:28Chinese tea was what they were after.
0:18:28 > 0:18:30It had become an English addiction
0:18:30 > 0:18:32and they'd stop at nothing to get it.
0:18:32 > 0:18:35The Qing authorities set limits on the trade,
0:18:35 > 0:18:39insisting tea could only be bought for silver.
0:18:39 > 0:18:40But the English paid with opium
0:18:40 > 0:18:43they could pick up for next to nothing in India.
0:18:46 > 0:18:49Millions of Chinese became drug addicts,
0:18:49 > 0:18:54brain baffled by the foreign devils caricatured in cartoons like this.
0:18:57 > 0:19:01The end result? China seized British hauls of opium
0:19:01 > 0:19:04and the British retaliated, starting a war which,
0:19:04 > 0:19:08thanks to the technological limitations of the Chinese,
0:19:08 > 0:19:10was heavily stacked in favour
0:19:10 > 0:19:13of His Royal Majesty the King of England's drug dealers.
0:19:15 > 0:19:19In 1842, after three years of battles,
0:19:19 > 0:19:22Britain was victorious.
0:19:22 > 0:19:23Now...
0:19:25 > 0:19:27..under the Treaty of Nanjing,
0:19:27 > 0:19:30the British were granted - or, rather, took -
0:19:30 > 0:19:33a small fortune in silver from the Chinese,
0:19:33 > 0:19:38as reparation for their war losses,
0:19:38 > 0:19:42they took a small place called Hong Kong in perpetuity,
0:19:42 > 0:19:47and the right to trade from and create settlements in five ports,
0:19:47 > 0:19:51the most important of which was Shanghai.
0:19:51 > 0:19:55This was a huge humiliation for the Qing.
0:19:55 > 0:20:01Imagine - a foreign power not only owning property on Chinese soil,
0:20:01 > 0:20:04but usurping Chinese trading rights.
0:20:04 > 0:20:08And I think the style in which the British chose to build
0:20:08 > 0:20:10their consulate here in Shanghai,
0:20:10 > 0:20:16with its rampantly colonial style, the finely trimmed lawn,
0:20:16 > 0:20:18I wonder if they weren't trying to rub it in a bit?
0:20:18 > 0:20:23A fine spot to drink a rather complacent cup of tea.
0:20:26 > 0:20:28Over the next two decades,
0:20:28 > 0:20:31the Qing began to lose the confidence of their people.
0:20:31 > 0:20:35There was popular unrest, uprisings, rebellions,
0:20:35 > 0:20:38tens of millions of Chinese lives lost.
0:20:38 > 0:20:42In 1860, during a second Opium War,
0:20:42 > 0:20:44the British struck a hammer blow
0:20:44 > 0:20:46from which the dynasty would never recover.
0:20:54 > 0:20:57It was a cold and knowing act of iconoclasm -
0:20:57 > 0:21:00an all-out attack on the Summer Palace.
0:21:09 > 0:21:13They looted its treasures, they levelled its stone building
0:21:13 > 0:21:15and they torched the rest.
0:21:15 > 0:21:18Within a month, they had destroyed
0:21:18 > 0:21:22the greatest jewel of the entire Qing empire.
0:21:22 > 0:21:26The French 19th-century writer Victor Hugo simply remarked,
0:21:26 > 0:21:27"We think we are civilised
0:21:27 > 0:21:30"and we think the Chinese are barbarians.
0:21:30 > 0:21:34"Look around - this is what civilisation did to barbarism."
0:21:42 > 0:21:44A century earlier, Emperor Qianlong
0:21:44 > 0:21:47had imagined Europe was something you could dally with -
0:21:47 > 0:21:49a source book of styles for an emperor
0:21:49 > 0:21:51to decorate his playground.
0:21:53 > 0:21:56Now, the playground was smashed.
0:21:56 > 0:21:59No-one in China was taking the West lightly any more.
0:22:13 > 0:22:15In the thriving port of Shanghai,
0:22:15 > 0:22:18Britain's international settlements had now been joined
0:22:18 > 0:22:21by French and American concessions.
0:22:21 > 0:22:25Foreign influence was having a transforming effect
0:22:25 > 0:22:27on the city's art and artists.
0:22:29 > 0:22:33Shanghai's a city that grew up in the 19th and 20th centuries.
0:22:33 > 0:22:34That's why it feels a little bit
0:22:34 > 0:22:38like a hybrid between Liverpool and New York.
0:22:38 > 0:22:41But thanks to the settlements, from the 1860s onwards,
0:22:41 > 0:22:44this was really an urban experience like no other.
0:22:44 > 0:22:48Not only did you have Westerners and Chinese living cheek by jowl,
0:22:48 > 0:22:50but the indigenous Chinese of Shanghai
0:22:50 > 0:22:53developed their own versions of Western architecture.
0:22:53 > 0:22:55Town houses, apartment blocks -
0:22:55 > 0:22:58they were living in new types of spaces.
0:22:58 > 0:23:01And suddenly, they lost their enthusiasm for the old forms
0:23:01 > 0:23:03of Chinese art, the scroll and the screen.
0:23:03 > 0:23:07What they wanted was pictures in frames to hang on their wall
0:23:07 > 0:23:09and lots of bright colours -
0:23:09 > 0:23:12a subtle change in taste, but a profound one.
0:23:28 > 0:23:31At first sight, this Shanghai School art
0:23:31 > 0:23:33can look a bit too pretty -
0:23:33 > 0:23:35wallpaper for the new Chinese collectors
0:23:35 > 0:23:37of the international settlements
0:23:37 > 0:23:39to decorate their Western-style homes.
0:23:41 > 0:23:43But it's understandable that they wanted to look
0:23:43 > 0:23:47at colourful blooms, cuddly animals.
0:23:47 > 0:23:51Many of these new Chinese collectors were traumatised refugees,
0:23:51 > 0:23:54fleeing the violence and bloodshed
0:23:54 > 0:23:57that had racked China throughout the 19th century -
0:23:57 > 0:24:00Opium Wars, the Taiping Rebellion.
0:24:05 > 0:24:08But the presence of foreign powers on Chinese soil
0:24:08 > 0:24:13was a continuing cause of confusion and anger,
0:24:13 > 0:24:15epitomised in a masterly self-portrait
0:24:15 > 0:24:20that the Shanghai School artist Ren Xiong created in the 1850s.
0:24:22 > 0:24:25The image of an angry young man in knife-edged clothing
0:24:25 > 0:24:27echoes the romantic self-portraits
0:24:27 > 0:24:30that European artists were painting at just this time.
0:24:31 > 0:24:33But it's hardly a homage -
0:24:33 > 0:24:35the scroll bears a pained inscription,
0:24:35 > 0:24:38lamenting China's territorial losses
0:24:38 > 0:24:42and the indignation of being subjugated to foreign powers.
0:24:48 > 0:24:52China's century of disasters came to a climax in 1894
0:24:52 > 0:24:55with the loss of the first Sino-Japanese War,
0:24:55 > 0:24:57fought over control of Korea.
0:25:00 > 0:25:02This was the most humiliating defeat of all.
0:25:02 > 0:25:07China had fallen so far behind, it wasn't just losing to the West,
0:25:07 > 0:25:10but to its own, far smaller neighbour, Japan,
0:25:10 > 0:25:13which HAD embraced Western technology.
0:25:14 > 0:25:17At the higher levels of Chinese society,
0:25:17 > 0:25:21there was a deep sense of shame and betrayal.
0:25:21 > 0:25:25Their rulers had let them down. It was time for change.
0:25:30 > 0:25:331911 was the year of the Great Revolution.
0:25:33 > 0:25:36The last Emperor, Puyi, still just a little boy
0:25:36 > 0:25:40who could barely reach his throne, was forced to abdicate.
0:25:42 > 0:25:47More than 2,000 years of dynastic history had been brought to an end.
0:25:51 > 0:25:54Chinese society would be fundamentally altered.
0:25:57 > 0:26:02So too would Chinese art. The old skills were no longer encouraged.
0:26:02 > 0:26:05Western-style industrial design began to displace
0:26:05 > 0:26:07brush and ink painting.
0:26:09 > 0:26:11And the Forbidden City, for so many centuries
0:26:11 > 0:26:15the principal source of commissions, was closed for business.
0:26:20 > 0:26:23After 1911, the new Republic of China would endure
0:26:23 > 0:26:26decades of political instability.
0:26:27 > 0:26:31The Nationalist leaders struggled to keep the country unified,
0:26:31 > 0:26:34as regional warlords exploited the power vacuum.
0:26:35 > 0:26:40And how did China's artists respond to these turbulent times?
0:26:42 > 0:26:46The more adventurous travelled west in search of fresh ideas.
0:26:46 > 0:26:49In 1919, a young painter called Xu Beihong
0:26:49 > 0:26:51went all the way to France
0:26:51 > 0:26:54and enrolled in the Ecole des Beaux Arts in Paris.
0:26:56 > 0:26:58When he returned to China eight years later,
0:26:58 > 0:27:01he adapted 19th-century French ideas
0:27:01 > 0:27:06to create a new kind of epic, politically engaged Chinese art.
0:27:08 > 0:27:10One, two, three.
0:27:10 > 0:27:14The most celebrated of his early paintings lies buried deep
0:27:14 > 0:27:17within the vaults of Beijing's Capital Museum.
0:27:20 > 0:27:21I think my Chinese is improving.
0:27:21 > 0:27:25That was Chinese for, "Whatever you do, don't drop it."
0:27:28 > 0:27:31Influenced by French painters' meditations
0:27:31 > 0:27:33on their own tumultuous times,
0:27:33 > 0:27:37like Delacroix's Liberty Storming The Barricades,
0:27:37 > 0:27:39the young painter's new work made him
0:27:39 > 0:27:42the most acclaimed and influential artist
0:27:42 > 0:27:45within a country still wracked by uncertainty.
0:27:47 > 0:27:48Ha-ha!
0:27:52 > 0:27:58So, this is the very first example of a fully fledged,
0:27:58 > 0:28:02Western European-style narrative history painting
0:28:02 > 0:28:06ever created in China, and it's 1928-30.
0:28:06 > 0:28:09Xu Beihong, in his own mind, is cutting edge.
0:28:09 > 0:28:11He's been trained in Paris.
0:28:11 > 0:28:13He's been trained at the Beaux Arts.
0:28:13 > 0:28:17He's studied anatomy, he's studied Delacroix, Gericault, Courbet.
0:28:17 > 0:28:18He's studied Veronese,
0:28:18 > 0:28:21the great tradition of the Italian Renaissance.
0:28:21 > 0:28:26In truth, Western modern painting has moved on from this style.
0:28:26 > 0:28:30We've had Cubism, Futurism, Surrealism is just being born
0:28:30 > 0:28:32at the point when this picture is being painted.
0:28:32 > 0:28:36But for him and for his audience, this is startlingly new.
0:28:39 > 0:28:41Now, what has he done?
0:28:41 > 0:28:45He's taken a moment from Chinese history when Tian Heng,
0:28:45 > 0:28:47he's the hero of the painting,
0:28:47 > 0:28:53he realises that he cannot possibly defeat the Emperor of the time.
0:28:53 > 0:28:57Rather than accept surrender, accept defeat,
0:28:57 > 0:29:00he is going to kill himself.
0:29:02 > 0:29:05This is the moment when he announces
0:29:05 > 0:29:07to his 500 followers that he will leave.
0:29:07 > 0:29:10He doesn't tell them he's going to kill himself, but they know.
0:29:10 > 0:29:13That's why you've got this pervasive sense of melancholy.
0:29:13 > 0:29:16These figures reaching out.
0:29:19 > 0:29:22And right at the centre of the painting,
0:29:22 > 0:29:25as if to sign it with his own identity,
0:29:25 > 0:29:27he's placed a self-portrait.
0:29:30 > 0:29:33In fact, several of the characters in the picture
0:29:33 > 0:29:36represent people he knew. These are his friends.
0:29:36 > 0:29:40This rather dignified, solemn figure,
0:29:40 > 0:29:44that's actually the security guard at his school.
0:29:45 > 0:29:47This is his daughter.
0:29:50 > 0:29:54At this moment in time, hostilities between China
0:29:54 > 0:29:59and its great enemy, Japan, were deepening.
0:29:59 > 0:30:02What he's done is he's painted a collective portrait of China
0:30:02 > 0:30:07facing this solemn, sad, difficult moment.
0:30:07 > 0:30:09A new kind of art...
0:30:09 > 0:30:13for a new sense of national emergency.
0:30:21 > 0:30:25In this climate, Xu Beihong's art struck a chord for the Chinese.
0:30:25 > 0:30:30But he wasn't the only artist importing alternative Western ideas.
0:30:31 > 0:30:35Lin Fenmiang also went to France during the early 1920s,
0:30:35 > 0:30:38falling under the spell of a very different
0:30:38 > 0:30:41and rather more modern tradition of painting.
0:30:43 > 0:30:46The table top Cubism of Braque and Picasso.
0:30:51 > 0:30:55Cezanne's still-lives also enthralled him.
0:30:55 > 0:30:57And you can see their influence everywhere
0:30:57 > 0:31:00in Lin Fenmiang's homages to his heroes.
0:31:05 > 0:31:09He also painted Chinese versions of the Odalisques of Matisse.
0:31:13 > 0:31:14For all its modernisation,
0:31:14 > 0:31:19China wasn't ready for Western-style avant-garde art.
0:31:19 > 0:31:23Fengmian's work was seen as weird, outlandish.
0:31:23 > 0:31:25And it was deeply unpopular.
0:31:31 > 0:31:34Chinese politics was so frenzied during these years
0:31:34 > 0:31:37that the Chinese artists were virtually,
0:31:37 > 0:31:41and then literally, compelled to take political sides.
0:31:42 > 0:31:44A new political force had emerged
0:31:44 > 0:31:47and was vying for power with the Nationalists.
0:31:47 > 0:31:51The Chinese Communist Party had found its inspiration
0:31:51 > 0:31:53in the Russian Revolution.
0:31:53 > 0:31:57During the 1930s, the Communists began to challenge the government.
0:31:57 > 0:32:01That internal strife was then overshadowed by disaster -
0:32:01 > 0:32:06a second major war with imperialist, expansionist Japan.
0:32:07 > 0:32:11July 7, 1937, this bridge,
0:32:11 > 0:32:16once admired by Marco Polo for its 500 carved lions,
0:32:16 > 0:32:19this bridge separates Japanese garrison over there,
0:32:19 > 0:32:21a Chinese town over there.
0:32:22 > 0:32:27Silly little dispute over a missing soldier, but then it escalates.
0:32:27 > 0:32:29Shots are fired. It escalates again.
0:32:29 > 0:32:32It turns into full-blown war.
0:32:32 > 0:32:3620 million Chinese dead.
0:32:36 > 0:32:3995 million refugees.
0:32:39 > 0:32:43The country is rocked to its foundations.
0:32:47 > 0:32:52In 1941, the death, displacement and atrocious suffering
0:32:52 > 0:32:55caused by the second Sino-Japanese War
0:32:55 > 0:32:58roused Xu Beihong to create one of his most enduringly famous images.
0:33:00 > 0:33:04A work still much reproduced throughout China today.
0:33:05 > 0:33:09I met the artist's son who kindly agreed to show it to me.
0:33:09 > 0:33:12Merci pour...
0:33:12 > 0:33:16Like his father, Xu Qingping studied in France.
0:33:16 > 0:33:19So we had one language in common.
0:33:19 > 0:33:22TRANSLATION FROM FRENCH:
0:33:53 > 0:33:57No 100 horses here, just one.
0:33:57 > 0:34:00And it's surely significant that, adapting his medium
0:34:00 > 0:34:02to his patriotic Chinese message,
0:34:02 > 0:34:07Xu Beihong went back to the traditional Chinese scroll.
0:35:20 > 0:35:22It's a beautiful image.
0:35:22 > 0:35:23Merci, merci.
0:35:25 > 0:35:28The Sino-Japanese conflict fused into the global melee
0:35:28 > 0:35:30of the Second World War.
0:35:30 > 0:35:34And Japan's eventual surrender in 1945 left China free
0:35:34 > 0:35:37to resume its bloody internal power struggle.
0:35:39 > 0:35:41Four years later, in 1949,
0:35:41 > 0:35:44the Communist Party finally took control.
0:35:44 > 0:35:46After four decades of chaos,
0:35:46 > 0:35:50the Chinese breathed a collective sigh of relief.
0:35:50 > 0:35:53There were high hopes for their new leader, Mao Zedong.
0:35:53 > 0:35:57The saviour began his radical reforms immediately.
0:36:02 > 0:36:06Although Mao claimed to despise the imperial past,
0:36:06 > 0:36:07he used art and architecture
0:36:07 > 0:36:10to proclaim the legitimacy of his rule
0:36:10 > 0:36:12with every bit as much determination
0:36:12 > 0:36:15as the Emperors of China's dynastic history.
0:36:18 > 0:36:20So this is Tiananmen Square
0:36:20 > 0:36:24and it still perfectly reflects Chairman Mao's idea
0:36:24 > 0:36:28of how the new Communist state and its powers should be expressed
0:36:28 > 0:36:31in the form of architecture and sculpture.
0:36:31 > 0:36:36"Tiananmen" means "heavenly peace gate". And there is the gate.
0:36:36 > 0:36:41It marks the border between this space and the Forbidden City,
0:36:41 > 0:36:43the old arena of imperial power.
0:36:43 > 0:36:45In fact, this used to be part of the Forbidden City,
0:36:45 > 0:36:48but Mao took it over and made it his own.
0:36:50 > 0:36:53At one side you've got the Hall of the People.
0:36:53 > 0:36:55And here...
0:36:55 > 0:37:00with its great blazon of Communist power at the top,
0:37:00 > 0:37:03what used to be the People's Museum of the Revolution,
0:37:03 > 0:37:05it's now the National Museum of China.
0:37:06 > 0:37:11This is the architecture of 1950s Communist Russia.
0:37:11 > 0:37:17With its rectilinear, seemingly endlessly repeating columns,
0:37:17 > 0:37:20its daunting scale.
0:37:20 > 0:37:23The individual is nothing,
0:37:23 > 0:37:26the communal is everything.
0:37:27 > 0:37:29It's impressive.
0:37:29 > 0:37:31But more than a little forbidding.
0:37:39 > 0:37:42Mao's new state buildings had to be huge
0:37:42 > 0:37:45to accommodate the teeming masses of the Chinese people.
0:37:48 > 0:37:51But having built this enormous stone box,
0:37:51 > 0:37:55his next problem was what to put in it.
0:37:57 > 0:38:03Now, they call this the Hall of Chinese Classical Modern Painting.
0:38:03 > 0:38:06But I think what it really represents
0:38:06 > 0:38:10is Mao's almost frenetic attempt
0:38:10 > 0:38:14to fill the void of all that imperial history
0:38:14 > 0:38:16he'd done away with at a stroke
0:38:16 > 0:38:21and to commission new paintings of his era, his time,
0:38:21 > 0:38:23his party, his China.
0:38:23 > 0:38:25There he is, Mao with his comrades,
0:38:25 > 0:38:30gathered around a table discussing the works of Karl Marx.
0:38:30 > 0:38:33Very serious expressions on their faces.
0:38:33 > 0:38:37There he is, the young scholar, with a vision,
0:38:37 > 0:38:40standing on top of a mountain.
0:38:41 > 0:38:46Here, planning the great victory against the Nationalist Party,
0:38:46 > 0:38:50the victory that will seal Communist success.
0:38:50 > 0:38:52See how he's represented,
0:38:52 > 0:38:55in a simple room, in plain clothes, in drab light.
0:38:55 > 0:39:02This is the victory of absolutely the opposite of ostentation,
0:39:02 > 0:39:03it's the triumph of the simple.
0:39:06 > 0:39:10This wall reaches its conclusion with...
0:39:12 > 0:39:14..a moment of perfect unity.
0:39:14 > 0:39:19This is the moment when the pincer movement,
0:39:19 > 0:39:21the two forces of the Red Army, met,
0:39:21 > 0:39:23the moment when they felt sure
0:39:23 > 0:39:29they would get victory over the enemy, the Nationalist Party.
0:39:29 > 0:39:33And everybody, every single person without exception,
0:39:33 > 0:39:37has got a beaming smile on their face.
0:39:38 > 0:39:42Collective unity, Communism, happiness.
0:39:42 > 0:39:47Sadly, the reality would not turn out to be like that.
0:39:54 > 0:39:56Mao saw himself as the great moderniser,
0:39:56 > 0:39:59a man whose mission it was to drag China
0:39:59 > 0:40:03from the feudal, imperial past into the modern world.
0:40:04 > 0:40:05He did some good.
0:40:05 > 0:40:09Emancipating women from the harshly patriarchal Confucianism
0:40:09 > 0:40:13that had restrained their ambitions for millennia.
0:40:13 > 0:40:15And allowing peasants to own their homeland.
0:40:17 > 0:40:19But he also did an awful lot of bad.
0:40:21 > 0:40:26The great leap forward was meant to accelerate industrial progress.
0:40:26 > 0:40:31Farmers were encouraged to produce steel in so-called back yard furnaces
0:40:31 > 0:40:33instead of tending their crops.
0:40:33 > 0:40:35With catastrophic results.
0:40:38 > 0:40:40Food production plummeted.
0:40:40 > 0:40:43Between 1958 and 1961,
0:40:43 > 0:40:47around 30 million Chinese people starved to death.
0:40:58 > 0:41:02And as the country lurched into chaos, what did the great leader do?
0:41:03 > 0:41:08He did what so many 20th-century leaders have done.
0:41:08 > 0:41:11He cranked up his propaganda machine.
0:41:11 > 0:41:18Some 2.2 billion images of Mao were created during the Communist era.
0:41:18 > 0:41:20That's why...
0:41:20 > 0:41:23the stalls of today's street markets
0:41:23 > 0:41:26are full of Chairman Mao propaganda.
0:41:26 > 0:41:30These must be among the least rare collectable objects
0:41:30 > 0:41:32in the entire world.
0:41:37 > 0:41:40In 1966, to galvanise his waning support,
0:41:40 > 0:41:44Mao called on his young Red Guard to join him in a new mission,
0:41:44 > 0:41:46a cultural revolution.
0:41:48 > 0:41:52Old scrolls, old paintings, old porcelain,
0:41:52 > 0:41:55anything from the imperial past or the decadent West,
0:41:55 > 0:42:00all were condemned, their owners liable to be tortured...
0:42:00 > 0:42:02or worse.
0:42:02 > 0:42:04Countless millions of works of art
0:42:04 > 0:42:07and literature were smashed or burnt.
0:42:12 > 0:42:15Nine out of ten artists were put on trial.
0:42:15 > 0:42:19Many were jailed, or "re-educated" in the countryside.
0:42:21 > 0:42:24Lin Fengmian was a case in point.
0:42:24 > 0:42:28He was subjected to forced labour and torture, despite destroying most
0:42:28 > 0:42:32of the evidence of his wrongdoing, namely his own paintings.
0:42:35 > 0:42:38What we see here is almost all what they have about him from that era.
0:42:38 > 0:42:44- Wow, c'est tout?- C'est tout. Terrible, huh?- That is terrible.
0:42:44 > 0:42:45Terrible, terrible.
0:42:45 > 0:42:48You cannot imagine Picasso destroying his own painting.
0:42:48 > 0:42:50Or Matisse, you know, even. It's quite amazing.
0:42:50 > 0:42:52It's something very specific about...
0:42:54 > 0:42:57..what happened for Chinese artists in the 20th century.
0:42:57 > 0:43:01It's truly awful that when he was actually in, you know,
0:43:01 > 0:43:06the work camp, all they gave him was a brush to sweep.
0:43:06 > 0:43:08And when he was sweeping...
0:43:08 > 0:43:12sweeping the leaves, or whatever he was doing with his brush
0:43:12 > 0:43:15to clean, he would paint pictures in his imagination,
0:43:15 > 0:43:18- cos it was the only way he could paint pictures.- It's terrible.
0:43:18 > 0:43:23But the problem we have is destruction of the biggest part of
0:43:23 > 0:43:27the artwork, the problem for China, which is a problem for art historians
0:43:27 > 0:43:31because we have to guess what they have done before, for example.
0:43:31 > 0:43:34Well, I'm used to that with ancient Chinese art.
0:43:34 > 0:43:38You know, there are only 73 pieces of Ru ware left.
0:43:38 > 0:43:43- Archaeological, archaeology. - Archaeology of the recent past.
0:43:43 > 0:43:46It reminds me of a phrase of Andre Malraux.
0:43:46 > 0:43:48"Le musee imaginaire."
0:43:48 > 0:43:51A sort of terrible Chinese version of the imaginary museum
0:43:51 > 0:43:53where you have to remake the pictures
0:43:53 > 0:43:55that you've painted in the past.
0:43:55 > 0:44:01I just still can't get my mind around the horror of that situation.
0:44:07 > 0:44:11When Mao died in 1976, the government scapegoated other
0:44:11 > 0:44:14senior figures for the worst of his policies,
0:44:14 > 0:44:15preserving Mao's reputation
0:44:15 > 0:44:18and ensuring the survival of the Communist Party.
0:44:25 > 0:44:28In 1978, the new leader, Deng Xiaoping,
0:44:28 > 0:44:33made a symbolic journey to America, even donning a Stetson.
0:44:33 > 0:44:36The Wild West photo opportunity meant that China was
0:44:36 > 0:44:38open to the West once again.
0:44:45 > 0:44:49The impact on art and artists was immense.
0:44:49 > 0:44:52And it can still be felt today, for better and for worse,
0:44:52 > 0:44:56here at the 798 Art Zone in Beijing.
0:45:01 > 0:45:05This contemporary art playground was dreamed up in the late 1990s,
0:45:05 > 0:45:08in a complex of obsolete factories,
0:45:08 > 0:45:12once the epicentre of Mao's industrialisation programme.
0:45:12 > 0:45:15Artists set up their studios.
0:45:15 > 0:45:17Galleries opened for business.
0:45:19 > 0:45:21The place is still lively
0:45:21 > 0:45:22but rather commercialised.
0:45:27 > 0:45:30Much of the art on display is eclectic,
0:45:30 > 0:45:32often positively manic.
0:45:34 > 0:45:38But while it delivers a frisson, there's rarely a real shock.
0:45:41 > 0:45:45But away from the 798 Art Zone's sea of white noise,
0:45:45 > 0:45:48there are a number of artists creating work that speaks
0:45:48 > 0:45:51eloquently about the predicaments of modern China.
0:45:55 > 0:45:58One of them is Xu Bing, whose 1988 installation,
0:45:58 > 0:46:00A Book From The Sky,
0:46:00 > 0:46:05was created from block printed scrolls of calligraphy.
0:46:05 > 0:46:08Ancient technique, modern twist.
0:46:10 > 0:46:13Xu Bing's writing was gibberish,
0:46:13 > 0:46:15a bitter parody of Communist propaganda.
0:46:17 > 0:46:21A lament for the decades when all of China had to live
0:46:21 > 0:46:23inside a world of nonsense,
0:46:23 > 0:46:26the loopy proclamations of Chairman Mao.
0:46:31 > 0:46:33Xu Bing's work made such an impact,
0:46:33 > 0:46:36it even spawned a range of nonsense clothing.
0:46:39 > 0:46:42But it was criticised by the Communist Party for expressing
0:46:42 > 0:46:44unacceptable sentiments.
0:46:45 > 0:46:49Shortly afterwards came the crackdown of 1989,
0:46:49 > 0:46:53the brutal suppression of protests in Tiananmen Square.
0:46:54 > 0:46:58Since then, there's been little room for doubt about
0:46:58 > 0:47:00the true nature of the modern Chinese state.
0:47:00 > 0:47:04It remains what it's been for thousands of years -
0:47:04 > 0:47:06a highly centralised machine
0:47:06 > 0:47:09for controlling untold millions of people.
0:47:13 > 0:47:16The soldiers marching in Tiananmen Square today are just the modern
0:47:16 > 0:47:21flesh and blood versions of the first emperor's terracotta soldiers.
0:47:27 > 0:47:31Artists can still get in trouble if they overstep the mark.
0:47:31 > 0:47:36Ai Weiwei, and all that. But most are left to get on with their work.
0:47:38 > 0:47:42Xu Bing's still working in a hybrid of oriental
0:47:42 > 0:47:46and western styles, looking back to the art of China's past,
0:47:46 > 0:47:49even as he addresses the issues of the present.
0:47:51 > 0:47:56His new work is the Tobacco Project, a sardonic reflection on
0:47:56 > 0:47:59global capitalism and China's new cult of money.
0:48:12 > 0:48:13Bing.
0:48:13 > 0:48:15- Hey.- Hey.
0:48:15 > 0:48:19I've never seen so many cigarettes in one place.
0:48:19 > 0:48:22What does it symbolise to you, or what does it say to you?
0:49:10 > 0:49:14You seem to be implying that there's something not entirely healthy
0:49:14 > 0:49:17about all this, that it might be bad for our health.
0:49:17 > 0:49:19THEY LAUGH
0:49:19 > 0:49:20Yeah, yeah!
0:49:23 > 0:49:26The Tobacco Project strikes me as a very traditional Chinese
0:49:26 > 0:49:29work of art, in sentiment if not appearance.
0:49:31 > 0:49:35After all, what could be more Chinese than worrying about materialism?
0:49:35 > 0:49:38Chinese thinkers have been worrying about that
0:49:38 > 0:49:40for more than 2,000 years.
0:49:42 > 0:49:46And the tiger economy is hardly new.
0:49:46 > 0:49:49Capitalism's not a Western import, but a Chinese invention.
0:49:52 > 0:49:55Visit the financial heart of Shanghai,
0:49:55 > 0:49:58gaze up at its towering monuments to getting and spending,
0:49:58 > 0:50:00and what do you see?
0:50:00 > 0:50:02A bold new skyline, yes.
0:50:02 > 0:50:07But expressing an ancient Chinese impulse to make money.
0:50:07 > 0:50:10Modern Shanghai is just another version
0:50:10 > 0:50:13of Emperor Huizong's city of Kaifeng
0:50:13 > 0:50:15immortalised in the Qingming Scroll
0:50:15 > 0:50:19where paper money changed hands back in the 11th century.
0:50:22 > 0:50:24It's just another version of Emperor Qianlong's
0:50:24 > 0:50:28prosperous Suzhou, with its 260 shops.
0:50:33 > 0:50:37Perhaps someone should paint a scroll of modern Shanghai.
0:50:44 > 0:50:46There is, of course, a flip side to all this wealth,
0:50:46 > 0:50:50this economic miracle, this new modern China.
0:50:51 > 0:50:54Yu Hong was born during the Cultural Revolution and trained
0:50:54 > 0:50:59in Western-style oil painting at Beijing's Academy of Fine Arts.
0:51:00 > 0:51:04Reacting against the hollow cheer of the Communist propaganda
0:51:04 > 0:51:07paintings she grew up with, her new works focus on those who've been
0:51:07 > 0:51:11psychically disturbed by China's gold rush.
0:51:13 > 0:51:16A lot of your work seems to be about...
0:51:16 > 0:51:20the state of anxiety, particularly among young people.
0:51:20 > 0:51:22What do you think will happen in China?
0:51:22 > 0:51:23What do you think the future holds?
0:51:23 > 0:51:27You can see in the newspapers, it is a change every day.
0:51:27 > 0:51:30Many people move from the countryside to the city.
0:51:30 > 0:51:36Apartments are very expensive. The living costs are very expensive.
0:51:36 > 0:51:41And the people everyday want to earn money. It's a pressure.
0:51:41 > 0:51:44So I have painted this series.
0:51:46 > 0:51:48- So, it's about the pressures faced by young people?- Yes.
0:51:48 > 0:51:50About the problem of depression
0:51:50 > 0:51:52- or melancholy in contemporary China? - Yes, yes.
0:51:54 > 0:51:57This is my close friend. She's a writer.
0:51:57 > 0:52:01She had tried suicide two times.
0:52:01 > 0:52:03- Oh, dear. - And she had burned her face.- Oh, no.
0:52:03 > 0:52:07- That's why she wears the glasses. - Dear, dear.
0:52:07 > 0:52:12When I interviewed her, she said that when she feels depressed,
0:52:12 > 0:52:15she always has a feeling she was in a hole.
0:52:15 > 0:52:18Nobody knows that she was there, nobody can help her.
0:52:18 > 0:52:21So I want to paint the...
0:52:21 > 0:52:24the deep pond as something like a hole.
0:52:24 > 0:52:25She is in the middle.
0:52:29 > 0:52:33- Who's this here? - He is one of my students.
0:52:33 > 0:52:36He's a performance artist.
0:52:36 > 0:52:39And he makes performance art with drawers?
0:52:39 > 0:52:44The drawers are something like box of memory.
0:52:44 > 0:52:46- Box of memory?- Yes.
0:52:46 > 0:52:50So, it's another kind of feeling. Maybe he wants to protect himself.
0:52:50 > 0:52:55Maybe he wants to separate from the other part of the world.
0:52:55 > 0:53:00- He wants to hide...- Yes.- ..in this sort of cabinet of memory?- Mh-hm.
0:53:03 > 0:53:06Yu Hong's works hark back to Xu Beihong's
0:53:06 > 0:53:09Beaux Arts history paintings of the 1920s
0:53:09 > 0:53:14but the melancholy she describes has still older roots.
0:53:14 > 0:53:17China's spent much of the last 300 years lurching from
0:53:17 > 0:53:20one disaster to another,
0:53:20 > 0:53:23from military crisis, to crisis of identity.
0:53:25 > 0:53:28Yet, perhaps because China's past IS so full of loss,
0:53:28 > 0:53:33and its future so uncertain, many artists seem passionate
0:53:33 > 0:53:36to preserve their Chinese sense of identity.
0:53:43 > 0:53:47Bingyi is one of many who keep up the venerable elegant gathering
0:53:47 > 0:53:50where artists join to practise calligraphy,
0:53:50 > 0:53:52and brush and ink painting.
0:53:54 > 0:53:57For her, it's spiritual nourishment, reviving old skills
0:53:57 > 0:54:00'and subtleties of perception,
0:54:00 > 0:54:04'just as the literati painters did in the 12th century
0:54:04 > 0:54:07'when they fled the Mongols to create an art of disaffection.'
0:54:11 > 0:54:14Bingyi and her friends see themselves as custodians
0:54:14 > 0:54:16of their culture,
0:54:16 > 0:54:19an idea foreign to most contemporary artists in the West.
0:54:26 > 0:54:31In the deconsecrated Taoist Temple that's her Beijing studio,
0:54:31 > 0:54:35Bingyi's created a no-man's land between past and present.
0:54:36 > 0:54:41Her latest piece is a traditional scroll smoked by abstract forms that
0:54:41 > 0:54:45evoke destruction and the beauty that can emerge from it.
0:54:47 > 0:54:51- So, it's called the Shape Of The Wind.- Yes.
0:54:51 > 0:54:55So, I'm meant to follow it with my eye. I am the wind.
0:54:55 > 0:54:56How did you create it?
0:54:56 > 0:54:59It looks to me like you threw it or you poured it.
0:54:59 > 0:55:03- It's got quite an action painting feel about it.- Absolutely.
0:55:03 > 0:55:07First of all, you burn paper to paint this.
0:55:07 > 0:55:12So it's an image made on a scroll of paper created from another
0:55:12 > 0:55:16- burnt scroll of paper? - That's right.- Ah! So, it's ashes?
0:55:16 > 0:55:19- Yes, it's ashes.- So, what do you do? You mix the ashes with water?
0:55:19 > 0:55:22- And ink.- And ink!- Yes, and ink.
0:55:22 > 0:55:25So, there is a traditional calligraphy scroll Chinese element,
0:55:25 > 0:55:29- so to speak, lurking within it?- Yes. Originally,
0:55:29 > 0:55:33this piece was going to be shown in the National Cathedral in Berlin.
0:55:33 > 0:55:37That cathedral went through a fire during the war.
0:55:37 > 0:55:42So we decided to use fire as a thematic choice.
0:55:42 > 0:55:46Much of the creation of the world, especially of the recent centuries,
0:55:46 > 0:55:50was done through destruction, or through catastrophe.
0:55:50 > 0:55:54- And this is precisely about that. - A little bit like China.
0:55:54 > 0:55:58- It's just China. - It's just China.
0:55:58 > 0:56:03It's the allegorical expression of what we know, or what I know
0:56:03 > 0:56:07of a certain time, perhaps the perpetual time of this country.
0:56:07 > 0:56:10It's interesting you say that because I've been
0:56:10 > 0:56:13reflecting on Chinese history while I've been here.
0:56:13 > 0:56:14And, on the one hand,
0:56:14 > 0:56:18you have people who are constantly emphasising the unbroken continuity
0:56:18 > 0:56:21of Chinese civilisation, and I was thinking, "Hang on!"
0:56:21 > 0:56:23The history of China is full of
0:56:23 > 0:56:26vast, cataclysmic moments of destruction.
0:56:26 > 0:56:27It's one of the reasons why
0:56:27 > 0:56:29there are so few historical buildings left.
0:56:29 > 0:56:34It's very hard to find a capsule of the past that is intact in China
0:56:34 > 0:56:37- because it's been repeatedly swept away.- That's true.
0:56:37 > 0:56:40We've taken away so much, so fast...
0:56:42 > 0:56:45..that we don't even remember what we had before.
0:56:45 > 0:56:51Nonetheless, we can't just lament the loss of that.
0:56:51 > 0:56:56We have to come to terms with that by realising such powers
0:56:56 > 0:56:59bear all kinds of results.
0:57:00 > 0:57:03It turned us into the possibility we are today.
0:57:05 > 0:57:11China is an example of such radicalism at work.
0:57:11 > 0:57:15It's bubbly, it's expressive, it's alive.
0:57:18 > 0:57:20If there's one moral to be drawn
0:57:20 > 0:57:23from the last 4,000 years of Chinese history,
0:57:23 > 0:57:26it's that no matter how appalling the catastrophes
0:57:26 > 0:57:30that befall the Chinese people, they always find a way to recover.
0:57:35 > 0:57:38A long time ago, the sage Laozi wrote,
0:57:38 > 0:57:42"Water is fluid, soft and yielding.
0:57:43 > 0:57:47"But water will wear away rock which is rigid and cannot yield.
0:57:47 > 0:57:50"What is soft is strong."
0:57:57 > 0:58:01Despite these cycles of destruction and obliteration,
0:58:01 > 0:58:04the creativity of China's artists has never been stemmed
0:58:04 > 0:58:07and still continues to flow,
0:58:07 > 0:58:10adding to the great scroll of Chinese art.
0:58:15 > 0:58:19But how could it be otherwise in a society so enchanted by images
0:58:19 > 0:58:22that even its language is a form of picture making?