Associação Cultural Videobrasil

People's Video

When Chinese leader Deng Xiaoping draw a circle around Shenzhen, a village of fishermen not far from the present Guangzhou, China was experimenting its cultural post-revolution. Chinese people were used to political slogans and the communist economical life. When walking on the streets, one could see all the people wearing identical blue clothes. There were 100 million bikes on the streets in the rush hour. That was China in 1978. Chinese people could not imagine even in dreams that the circle drawn by Deng Xiaoping would give place, 25 years later, to an international metropolis. The nation completely changed. Now what we see on the streets are car lines that look like a huge dragon, people wearing colourful clothes, former yards giving place to skyscrapers, which symbolize that we have had a great economic achievement. There are department stores, megastores, news booths, McDonald's, boutiques, colourful advertising boards. China became a large consumer nation. On the basis of all these major changes there is a system with pyramid structure. The peasant is in the bottom layer. There are two kinds of peasants: the one who works hard on land and the other who works in towns. The first ones are in general very humble. They produce food and agricultural products to the urban population and to their own consumption. A Chinese peasant has an annual income of 100 (US$ 12) or 200 (US$ 24) yuans, while urban rich people spend over 10 thousand yuans (US$ 1,209) a year. The majority of peasants who go to towns is young and lively. In general they benefit from the communist education and graduate from junior high school or senior high school. They work in the production line of foreign capital corporations in Guangzhou and Shenzhen, and receive 700 (US$ 85) or 800 (US$ 97) yuans, what is half of an ordinary wage in America. It is a very cheap labor force. Due to this exploitation, Chinese output is cheaper than that in most of other nations. Clothes and home appliances are also cheap in the domestic market. That was the secret of the sudden boom of Chinese economy. A direct result of this economic feat is the abundance of electronic products. The Chinese peasant is the manufacturer and the consumer of cheap electronic products. At the beginning of the 1990's, automatic minicameras were fashionable in China. Their price ranged from 30 or 40 (US$ 5) yuans to 500 or 600 (US$ 73) yuans. The appearing of minicameras changed the way in which people register their personal history. Rich Chineses began travelling and taking their own photos. Video works began reflecting aspects of each individual's lifestyle. Video in China has definitely become a domain of the consumer masses. People gradually began shooting videos instead of taking photos, what represents a development in the individual photographic history of Chinese people. The low cost of domestic video cameras and DV is in the base of that change. Pirate CDs have also a role in the process. In China, for 3 or 5 yuans (US$ 0,60) anyone can watch great Western films or gunfight movies from Hong Kong or Taiwan at home. Urban and rural workers created video associations so that they can watch films together in bars or at home. With the appearing of the DV, many people instantaneously became videomakers. They use the DV to record what they observe. The major changes in Chinese society are their focus. Some of them just record in video photographic images of rural workers, elections in villages, the daily life of ordinary people, rich men and opulent foreigners. These documentaries with individual character are quickly absorbed in the market and become consumer goods. The identity of the art created by Chinese video directors is a very interesting phenomenon. Most videomakers did not graduate from cinema or arts schools. They come from different professions. There are reporters, writers, teachers, students, poets, workers, policemen, doctors, cameramen, graphic designers. The differences among their professions and life histories are translated into all kinds of DV styles. In China, with few years of experience, video artists become full of personality and passion. They shoot documentaries, short drama films and pure video art which sometimes only express a concept. This is a generation of dreammakers. These people changed the video history and their style forms an obvious contrast with that of the generation prior to 1998. They are younger. Their works are more interesting. In China, they live for the DV, making their own work or other's works. The “People's Video” program focuses on the relation between the diversity of artists' identities and that of their works. The artist Ma Yongfeng, from Shenzhen, makes videos and is also a reporter. Graduated in foreign languages, he deals with the dissimulation of human beings. He puts a golden fish into a washing machine and uses it as an artist. The rotation of the washing machine changes the fish's movements and, in result, its way of life. “Cutting Flowers”, by artist Huang Yan from Beijing, is about children. In China, the children are called the flowers of the nation, in a meaningful metaphor. Yan chooses a child among thousands of Chinese children and lets this child sit within living flowers and cut them. In the course of the work, the child shows a sleepy expression and the flowers gradually disappear, cut by scissors. In “Family Name”, Huang Yan collects family names, TV media and moments in the life of urban people in an attempt to reveal the relation between Chinese family names and the changes of the era. Huang Yan studied design in the university where he is now a teacher. Guo Dong, from Shenzhen, is an art director in a large publishing company. He is a famous designer. His work “Shit Age” is a mix of performance, digital cartoon and Chinese music all with humour and a great graphic style. Wu Ershan is graduated from the Beijing Film Academy. He works as a freelancer in the film market. His fiction “Open Fire” satirizes the gunfight films in a typical film language. “Destroying Perfectness” is the work by the performing art Group 72/74, which is formed by young artists from Shijiazhuang. Always emphasizing a specific kind of narrative style, they mix performance and improvise with a body language that shows the desire of urban people. A member of the group, Huang Junhui takes the act of crawling to the extreme in “Crawling”. When he crawls on the grass, his body and the green grass form a picture of pure beauty. But it must hurt his body... All the members of the group are independent artists. Mai Zi is the lead singer of a famous rock band in China. The director of “Barock” is the youngest artist in the show. He studies in the primary school annex to the Shengyang Lu Xun Arts College. It's hard to believe that the succinct language of the film has been created by a young boy. The skilled shooting method in black-and-white video turns the real space into a super real space and the humorous plot announces the coming of an era when Chinese images would have become ordinary. These young people grow up watching Hollywood and art films. The artist Yu Xudong, from Guangzhou, graduated at the Oil Painting Department in the Guangzhou Art School, where he is now a teacher. Before making videos, he was a sculptor. His work “Pill” is related to the illness according to the psychological analysis. But the use of the plastic aspect of pills and their colourful tints creates a sophisticated combination. That is a work on living sculptures. Three artists are third grade students at the Fine Arts Department in the Xiamen University. They are specializing in new media. Their teachers are experts in European video art. The works reflect their thoughts and the character of European art. They are the new Chinese potential. They grow up in the world of senses, material and spiritual nutrients. They are easily hurt, but live happily. “People's Video” is only a conception. It shows China as a big supermarket today. Anyone can get the desired food or booze. This is an era in which all the flowers bloom. The younger Chinese video artists realized the importance of the independent ego and see the world - the material world - with a critical insight.

ASSOCIAÇÃO CULTURAL VIDEOBRASIL, "Displacements - 14th International Eletronic Art Festival": 22nd September to 19th October 2003, pp. 260-261, São Paulo, Brazil, 2003.