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Although some textbooks continue to occasionally refer to the Yellow River valley and the northern plain of north China as the “cradle of Chinese civilization,” spectacular archaeological finds in the 20th and 21st centuries have increasingly challenged the way we see early China and the formation of Chinese civilization during the Bronze Age period (ca. 2000 BCE – 221 BCE). These archaeological finds include areas such as the famed Sanxingdui site in the Sichuan basin along the Jian River, as well as a number of archaeological finds in and around modern Hunan Province that are commonly associated with Chu culture and that are featured in China Institute’s spring 2011 exhibition, Along the Yangzi River: Regional Culture of the Bronze Age from Hunan (see map on the left). These various finds evoke a complex but intriguing story of the cultural diffusion of bronze metallurgy and of local identities evident when comparing individual pieces from specific regional sites and those of other regions. What emerges is a fuller picture of a complex human geography associated with different geographic regions in ancient China.

An example of these distinctive features can be seen in the remarkable bronze standing figure of the Sanxingdui find (see mid-section to the left) and represents a cultural artifact that some scholars associate with the later Shu culture of the Sichuan basin. This large scale human figure stands over eight feet tall (including the pedestal) and its humanoid form is entirely unique from contemporaneous Shang dynasty bronze ware of the 14th-12th centuries BCE, although decorative elements on the garment are similar to Shang motifs indicating some cultural interaction. Its oversized hands clearly were intended to hold something (perhaps a weapon or an elephant tusk?), and it seems to represent some symbolic member of the community (a priest or ancestor perhaps?). While it fires the imagination to speculate on what its cultural significance was, it nevertheless clearly shows a distinct culture of the time period.

Another noteworthy element of this piece is its incorporation of four animal heads with elongated snouts on the base that seem to evoke elephants. Elephants once roamed throughout the ecological systems of the Yangzi River, and we can see this evident in a very lifelike elephant-shaped zun vessel from the Hunan region that dates roughly from the same time as the Sanxingdui example (see bottom left example). The prevalence of vessels in the shape of three dimensional animals is a striking characteristic of southern bronze Chinese culture along the Yangzi river.

While it is virtually impossible to know definitively whether the unique characteristics of southern Chinese bronze ware is informed by entirely unique religious regional customs, knowing the geographic locations of finds and investigating the distinctive decorative motifs lends itself to a greater appreciation of the geographic diversity of early China.

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The discovery in 1976 of Lady [Fu] Hao’s burial tombs near Anyang, in China’s northern Henan Province, presented scholars and archaeologists with an amazing find: the first tomb of the Ruins of Yin burial ground to be discovered undisturbed by looters since the tomb was sealed from the light of day around 1250 BCE. Besides the lacquered coffin of the venerated lady-general Fu Hao there were around two thousand items found inside, including over seven hundred jade objects, 1.6 metric tons of bronze-ware and the sacrificial remains of six dogs and sixteen human beings. This was indeed the most important archaeological find in the Ruins of Yin (殷墟), which marks the site of the last capital of the Shang Dynasty. A dynastic state that lorded over the people of the North China Plain two millennia before the common era and oversaw the first known development of Chinese script, the Shang had long been widely discussed throughout the vast tradition of Chinese historical writings, including in those of the great Han Dynasty eunuch-scribe Sima Qian, the standard-bearer of ancient Chinese historiography; however, archaeological evidence confirming the existence of this ancient civilization was missing until the rediscovery of the Ruins of Yin in 1899. Due to complicating factors, including periods of warfare, archaeologists did not locate the tomb of Lady Hao for nearly eighty years, but this single discovery provided them with unparalleled opportunities for studying the Shang civilization and its remarkable culture.

Fu Hao (妇好), chief consort to the King Wu Ding (武丁), was an extraordinary individual, and the riches arranged beside her body illustrate her enormous wealth and the great respect paid to her when she died. Similar to the other tombs in the Ruins of Yin necropolis, Fu Hao’s is actually a burial pit 7.5 meters deep, and its size and large collection of artifacts prove that she was a figure of great importance. The array of bronze weapons, unusual for a woman’s tomb, is an indicator of Fu Hao’s experience as a military leader in charge of several campaigns against other tribes. King Wu Ding also entrusted her to carry out ritual ceremonies, to communicate with the Shang ancestors on behalf of the king, a matter of enormous respect and vital importance to the state. Shang diviners communicated with the ancestors in one of two principal ways: through interpretation of the cracks on large animal bones and turtle plastrons that had been heated and pierced, or through offerings of food and wine. The animal bones and turtle plastrons that underwent this process of divination are known today as ‘oracle bones.’ Inscribed on these ‘bones’ are questions proposed to the ancestor spirits, interpreted responses, followed by commentary. There are 170-180 surviving specimens that refer specifically to Lady Hao, providing evidence of her military exploits and her ritual responsibilities to the state.

Considered quite modest in size compared to other tombs nearby belonging to kings and other nobility, the huge deposit of bronze, jade, ivory and pottery artifacts found inside Fu Hao’s tomb testifies to the craftsmanship of the Shang artisans, and it demonstrates the importance and value of these material objects to the nobility. Due to the time and labor involved in producing bronze and jade artifacts, these items were extremely valuable and were prized possessions (see Material Culture). Bronze ware alone involved the collaborative efforts of a large network of skilled individuals who could mine the elements, smelt and combine the alloy and then construct the ornate, detailed molds into which the alloy would be poured. Besides having a great deal of aesthetic value, these magnificent bronze vessels were highly prized by their owners and were intended to be used in ritual practices of ancestor worship, bestowing honor and wealth on the deceased, currying favor and entreating advice in a dangerous, unpredictable world.

Ancestor worship was a crucial practice to the Shang and later Zhou peoples, and it became a central element of Chinese culture with traditions carried on to this day. The belief held that deceased ancestors inhabited a spiritual realm that existed together with the physical world. Ancestors possessed the power to influence events in the physical world and could act as intermediaries, carrying prayers to the divine forces that ultimately controlled the fearful patterns of the world, from the devastating floods of the Yellow River to the fortunes, good and bad, dealt every person. Ancestors were likewise an otherworldly resource for information on matters both mundane and extraordinary alike. Oracle bones, with their detailed questions and commentary etched directly onto them, provide us with physical evidence of these spiritual interrogations. Meanwhile, the bronze ritual vessels, laid out in the tomb of the deceased, not only symbolized the great wealth and status of the tomb’s owner, but also provided the corpse the means to continue making offerings to the ancestors in the afterlife.

The act of offering food and wine to the ancestors, it was believed, put the physical world in direct contact with the realm of the ancestors. The Shang held a special veneration for wine, believing that the intoxicating effects could induce a psychic link with the ancestor spirit invoked in a ritual offering. Relatives acted as personators, representing the ancestor in physical form and playing the part during the ceremonial banquet, consuming the food and wine offerings until, drunk, he or she would be able to vocalize messages from the spiritual world. Today in China, people still provide food and wine at the graves of their deceased relatives, and often burn paper effigies of money and other prized possessions at gravesites as offerings. The Qingming festival (清明节), celebrated in China and Southeast Asia and known in English a ‘Tomb-Sweeping Day,’ is an especially important day for this ancient practice.

Lady Hao would have acted as this kind of diviner for the Shang king Wu Ding, performing oracle bone ceremonies and acting as personator for ritual banquets. Her importance to the Shang court was clearly significant; but to contemporary archaeologists and historians of China, she has played a momentous role, in so far that her tomb, fortunate among others for remaining away from the prying hands of thieves, has allowed us uncommon access to the ancient world of the Shang.

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The invention of bronze metallurgy heralded a new era for the civilizations that wielded the technology, and the various applications for this amazingly versatile material spread across multiple sectors of society and became deeply ingrained into their culture and economy. Bronze items, whether for military, ceremonial or mundane purposes, were praised for their durability and luster, and bronze technology, most likely first developed in Mesopotamia, eventually moved far and wide once it became a valued commodity. Evidence of bronze ware has been discovered across Europe, the Middle East, North Africa, and East Asia, where it emerged sometime in the third millennia BCE. The earliest archaeological evidence for the existence of bronze in China was found to be in the Majiayao (马家窑 ) culture that inhabited the upper Yellow River valley in the northwest of China around 3100—2700 BCE, even though the metallurgical craft did not reach the high form of artistry that we associate with ancient Chinese bronze-ware until the time of the Shang Dynasty, roughly one thousand years later.

Bronze is an alloy of copper with other materials, ordinarily tin – both abundant in many parts of East Asia. The bronze craftsmen of the Shang Dynasty preferred to include a small percentage of lead to the composite, which made pouring the molten bronze less difficult. (Tin counteracted copper’s brittleness, producing a material of adequate strength for use in chariots and military equipment, where it provided a decisive military advantage over earlier forms of weaponry.) Chinese craftsmen, unique among other bronze producing cultures, employed a technique known as the piece-mold process, wherein the mold was divided into removable sections, which would combine around a solid core, leaving enough empty space in between for the molten bronze to form the vessel. While bronze was useful for military purposes, ritual vessels were undoubtedly the most prevalent application, and these extraordinary objects became the very symbol of power for the Shang kings, as well as potent symbols of status for the elite.

Ancient ritual vessels, multitudinous in size and shape, were used in ceremonial banquets as containers of offerings to the ancestors and, as such, were traditionally divided into two major categories: containers for food and those for wine. They were usually inscribed with ornate decorations and some bore inscriptions referring to either the clan or the craftsmen who manufactured the pieces. Some vessels were made to commemorate a significant event, and may contain inscriptions, for example, detailing the success of a certain general’s military campaign or bestowing honor on a revered relative, friend, or ruler.

The craftsmen of these vessels would take meticulous care creating the designs, which, on some of the more complex pieces, are often an incredibly intricate assemblage of animal motifs, faces and abstract patterns. These designs would be worked into the molds and, once the molten bronze was poured in, would produce the reverse of the design on the final product. Although the craftsmen were rarely at liberty to experiment with new forms of vessels, they would, however, tweak design elements, making certain bronzes more detailed, more expensive, and including design elements favored by different cultures included in the Shang trade networks.

China Institute’s gallery exhibition, Along the Yangzi River: Regional Cultures of the Bronze Age from Hunan, displays bronzes of different Yangzi River cultures from the Hunan Provincial Museum in Changsha. While certainly a descendant of the great bronze culture of the Central Plain (i.e. at Anyang), these bronzes possess some unique qualities that distinguish them from bronzes favored elsewhere in China. In terms of design, the Hunan bronzes tend to be more stylized and feature a preference for animal designs, such as the tiger motif prominent on a number of pieces. Many of the vessels were cast in the shapes of animals, such as elephants or buffalo, in a similarly distinctive way. In addition, certain objects were more highly prized in these cultures than in the traditional bronze culture of the Central Plain. While many ding bronzes were the most prized possessions among the Anyang nobility, for example, the cultures of the middle Yangzi region held a unique preference for musical instruments, notably the nao bell, and a large number of these bells have been found in the area. This suggests that the cultures of this region maintained a degree of cultural independence, despite having political and economic ties to the Shang court.

Bronze vessels represent an amazing advancement for ancient Chinese civilization. Only a highly developed, stable society could possess the social and economic structure to produce bronze vessels of such craftsmanship and purpose for centuries on end. Thousands of bronzes have been discovered in China so far, and many more are unearthed each day. Each new find contributes to the field of understanding about ancient China and continues to bring to light the colorful beliefs and ritual practices of the ancient Chinese.

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The earliest pieces in the exhibition, Along the Yangzi River: Regional Cultures of the Bronze Age from Hunan, date from the Shang Dynasty and mark the beginnings of a recognizable Chinese civilization, but also indicate the existence of a diversity of cultures in ancient China. These bronzes provide an invaluable glimpse into ancient Chinese history, both as a testament to the technological advancement of the Shang dynasty as the region emerged from the Neolithic age, and as important clues to the cultures that created these works of art.

Ancient Chinese histories list the Xia Dynasty, founded by the legendary Yu the Great, as the first Chinese dynasty. While some scholars believe the Erlitou culture in the middle and western regions of modern-day Henan and Shanxi Provinces to be the Xia, the Shang Dynasty (ca. 1600 – ca. 1050 BCE) remains the earliest archaeologically verifiable dynasty. It was during the Shang that the first recognizable Chinese script developed and that an increase in specialized occupations indicative of a complexly organized society emerges. The earliest extant written records are the oracle bones found in Yinxu at Anyang and date to the middle of the Shang Dynasty. Earlier examples of characters exist, but these typically consist of clan names and short dedicatory phrases and do not represent a fully-developed writing system. The content of the written material suggests that the ability to write was limited to a small elite class, specifically the shamans who conducted the rituals of divination that were vital to the function and legitimacy of the state.

Archaeological evidence indicates that the late Erlitou had entered the Bronze Age, but the scale of production and quality of work increased significantly during the Shang. The stratification of society and the creation of cities were crucial to the Shang’s ability to support the bronze production process, which required expeditions to locate the copper, tin and lead found in Shang bronzes, the ability to mine these materials, and the military might to protect the workers and goods throughout the process. After the extraction of the ore, the bronze metallurgy process required foundries capable of reaching the required temperatures to smelt these metals, and artisans to create the piece -molds from which the bronzes were cast (see Material Culture). The developments of a stronger state structure exemplified by a code of punishments, an official class, an increased focus on rituals, and an organized military were therefore necessary elements for the successful production of bronzeware under the Shang.

Unlike many Bronze Age cultures elsewhere in the world, the primary use of bronze casting in China was for the creation of elaborate ritual vessels rather than agricultural tools or weaponry. The existence of an elite with expendable resources and a devotion to ancestor worship and funerary rituals drove the production of the intricate bronze drinking vessels and food containers, such as the ‘Square Bronze Zun with Beast Mask Pattern’ and the ‘Rectangular Bronze Ding Decorated with Human Mask Design’ featured in the exhibition (see People and Culture). The expense and technical expertise required for the production of bronzeware demonstrates the value of these pieces to the ruling elite. Bronzes became an integral part of the ritual process by the Shang Dynasty, and Kings depended on them as a symbol of their legitimacy and ability to communicate with and appease the ancestors.

The relation between bronzes, the divine, and the mandate to rule on earth is referenced in a variety of ancient legends and texts. In one, King Yu the Great had nine ding (food cauldrons) cast to symbolize the nine territories of his realm. According to legend, when the Xia Dynasty fell, these cauldrons were passed to the Shang Dynasty and then to the Zhou in the 11th century BCE, linking the symbolic importance of bronze vessels to the legitimacy of rule. While the form and style of bronze vessels varied over time and place, their primary use in ritual ceremonies by members of the elite and ruling families remained a defining characteristic. For example, the Shang preferred offerings of wine during rituals, and therefore produced a variety of wine vessels, whereas the later Zhou Dynasty believed that Shang overindulgence in wine had caused them to lose legitimacy in the eyes of heaven and shifted the focus of production to food cauldrons.

The Shang exerted a powerful force from their core power center in the western region of the north China plain, but they were not the only major civilization in China at the time. Typical examples of Shang bronze vessels are pieces like the ‘Bronze Zun in the Shape of an Elephant’ inspired from animals that lived in the region. Neighboring states existed that were contemporary to the Shang and interdependent, but arose from separate cultural origins and assumed a different path of development. Examples of these cultures include the Ba and Shu people of Sichuan and the incredible bronze works they produced at sites like Sanxingdui. Stylistically, the works vary considerably from Shang works at Yinxu, but some vessels retain the form of Shang vessels and therefore suggest a degree of interaction. Wucheng culture in the southeast is another example of a regional style unique from the Shang. Even within the Shang, stylistic differences existed, with the northern areas tending to prefer more fanciful representations of mythical animals, and the south preferring to depict existing animals on their bronze works.

When the Western Zhou replaced the Shang around ca. 1050 BCE, they retained the Shang emphasis on ritual but shifted the emphasis of worship to tian (‘Heaven’), and justified the takeover by accusing the Shang of losing tianming (‘the Mandate of Heaven’). The Zhou initially exerted a great degree of control over central China, facilitating the exchange of bronze stylistic motifs and trade in metal ore. During this period, designs became more abstracted and bronzes became valued as an indicator of prestige as well as tools for ritual. The inscriptions reflect the shift taking place during this time, as bronzes began to carry lengthier inscriptions indicating the wealth and importance of the owner. By the end of the Western Zhou (ca. 1045-771 BCE) bronzes lost their inscriptions altogether and were replaced with inlays of precious metals and stones. The Zhou Dynasty moved its capital to Luoyang in 771 BCE and its power subsequently declined significantly. Although there was a trend towards consolidation of wealth and power in ancient China, the absence of a strong central state power during the Eastern Zhou (771-256 BCE) resulted in increased warfare and struggle for dominance until the unification of China under the Qin Dynasty in 221 BCE. Bronze production remained important following the collapse of the Zhou, but is generally considered to have reached its height during the Shang and Zhou Dynasties. These pieces provide invaluable evidence of early China’s history, writing system, and cultures.

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Antiquarians have been collecting individual ancient Chinese bronze pieces for centuries, admiring the craftsmanship each piece exhibits as well as savoring the classical respect for ritualism so highly prized by the Confucian tradition. Indeed, to look at an individual piece of Chinese bronze ware is to wonder at the metallurgical skill and imaginative design that often went into the creation of that particular piece. For much of China’s Bronze Age the technique used for casting bronze ware was a laborious and complex process where artisans had to first fashion a clay model of the object, then pack an additional layer of clay around this mold that would dry and then be cut into sections and fired. The model sections were then shaved down becoming the core of the mold and the sections were reassembled around the core so that molten metal could be poured between the sections; once the bronze cooled, the mold was destroyed and the surface could be burnished smooth. This process meant that each piece had to be individually crafted each time and the mold then destroyed, making each piece unique – a truly astonishing fact when one considers the unparalleled quantity of bronze ware being cast in Ancient China! This bronze ware casting technique continued until the Eastern Zhou dynasty (c. 771 – 221 BCE), when the lost wax method of bronze casting was introduced allowing for a single mold to make multiple replica pieces.

While it is easy to admire the inherent artistry in individual pieces, it is important to realize that bronze ware in Ancient China was not merely a luxury item made for vain consumption. Bronze vessels were an important part of elite ancestor worship and state ritual; therefore, in order to appreciate the intended uses bronze ware vessels had in ancient China, one must not just look at pieces individually but must consider how they were grouped together and used in ceremonial sets. The various shapes of bronze ware pieces are rigidly classified according to their function as either food or drinking vessels as well as musical instruments that contributed to ritualistic practices. Inscriptions in pieces denote important events and contributions to the state that would bring honor and prestige to family ancestors as well as descendents “for generations without end.” These sets are frequently found in tomb settings demonstrating the ritualistic importance bronze ware sets had for ancient Chinese peoples.

With rapid economic growth in the late 20th and early 21st centuries, increased commercial land development has resulted in more discoveries being made of buried bronze artifacts. This has created a situation where Chinese archaeologists have to engage in salvage archaeology – archaeological survey and excavation must be rapidly carried out in conditions that are threatened by construction and development. While this means that more artifacts have contributed to our overall knowledge of this critical time period in the formation of Chinese civilization, the pieces are often ripped too early from their in situ context thus depriving researchers from doing important research into the relationship of individual pieces to one another at a particular site as well as what the significance of the location might have for our historical understanding. Many of these pieces subsequently enter the black market and are sold to individual collectors, thus complicating the ways in which researchers and students of the era can further benefit our general knowledge of ancient China’s Bronze Age.

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When the revered writer and social critic, Lǔ Xùn (鲁迅) (see Culture & People), pushed for a new form of Chinese woodcuts in the 1930′s, he strove for nothing less than social revolution by repositioning an ancient Chinese art form with a modern European style. By doing so, he separated woodcuts from their traditional antecedents, art forms like niánhuà (年画), the lively folk art usually attributed to the lunar new year. While the modern woodcuts that arose from Lu Xun’s efforts — such as those by artists like Lǐ Huà (李桦) and Hú Yīchuān (胡一川) — employ bleak contrasts of black and white and unsettling, sometimes violent, imagery to communicate social issues, nianhua are vibrant, colorful and unfailingly positive. Often translated somewhat misleadingly as ‘New Year Prints,’ (they are left up year-round and are sold during other festivals, such as the qīngmíng (清明) festival) nianhua have brightened Chinese homes since they became commercially available on a wide scale during the Táng (唐) dynasty (618-907).

Woodblock printing was first used in China between the third and the ninth centuries. In 1907, the British explorer Aurel Stein, working under still controversial circumstances, discovered the earliest datable example of woodblock printing, buried and forgotten for eight centuries in the Mogao grottos (mògāokū 莫高窟) outside Dūnhuáng (敦煌). Dated to 868 CE, The Diamond Sutra was printed on paper from exceptionally well crafted wooden blocks that suggest a back story of artistic development that archaeology has yet to recover. By the Míng (明) (1368 – 1644) and the Qīng (清) (1644 – 1911) dynasties, woodblock printing was used prolifically for a variety of illustrations and printings; but it was the mass popularity across China of nianhua as a visual medium that made this art form appealing to people such as Lu Xun, who wanted to educate a huge but largely illiterate population.

In the Chinese tradition, nianhua serve different functions in homes and businesses depending on the consumers, but their decorative appeal and connections with fate and good fortune are fundamental qualities. According to Chinese folk beliefs, certain nianhua foster the blessings and protection of powerful spirits and gods, and the imagery of nianhua is believed to evoke very specific connections with the user’s fate. A family of merchants, for example, might purchase a colorful depiction of teeming coffers of wealth, whereas the family of a young scholar studying for the civil service examinations might prefer an image depicting examination success. Sometimes, these images are chosen to capitalize on Chinese homonyms — a Chinese form of rebus. A colorful image of a monkey may therefore be symbolizing promotion to a higher office, as the word for ‘monkey’ and ‘high office’ are pronounced the same (hóu), differing only in written form (猴vs.侯).

Alternatively, some nianhua are used for protection. Ferociously depicted door gods (ménshén 门神)are positioned at front and back entrances of buildings to block evil spirits from entering and harming the occupants. Originating in Chinese mythology, door gods from the Tang dynasty on often feature historical characters. According to a legend, the Tang emperor Taìzōng (太宗) posted images of his most revered generals, the legendary Qìn Qióng (秦琼) and Yùchí Gōng (尉迟恭), outside his door as protection. As prints became more readily available with the development of woodblock printing technology, ordinary Chinese people began following this tradition, believing Qin Qiong and Yuchi Gong could safeguard their own locales. Another popular door god and protector is the fierce mythological figure, Zhōng Kuí (钟馗), who also features in Japanese art. It is said Zhong Kui visited the Emperor Xuánzōng (玄宗) in a dream to battle an evil spirit and protect the emperor, who then swore by Zhong Kui’s power. Usually depicted as a solitary figure, Zhong Kui is often posted on single doors while larger, double doors are usually flanked by pairs like Qin Qiong and Yuchi Gong.

Due to their high importance in China, cultural rituals have developed around some nianhua, specifically with regard to the prints of stove gods (sometimes translated as kitchen gods) that are hung in kitchens and feature lunar calendars together with colorful imagery. According to tradition, the stove god and his wife would watch over the family and take notes of everything that is said in the household before filing a report to the king of heaven, the Jade Emperor, at the end of the lunar year. These nianhua would be ritualistically burned on the twenty-third day of the twelfth lunar month to send off the stove god to heaven. Sometimes people would spread honey on his lips to sweeten his words (or perhaps to seal his lips) before he is sent on his journey. A week later, a new image, together with its accompanying calendar, would be posted on the kitchen wall to welcome the stove god’s new year blessings.

The imagery of nianhua and the folktales behind them can differ significantly depending on where in China the prints are produced and used (see Geography). The relatively simple and inexpensive technology behind their production gave rise to a ubiquitous material culture that offered the ideal medium for the modern woodcuts of the 1930′s. Influenced by the works of contemporary European expressionist woodcut artists such as Käthe Kollwitz and Frans Masereel, who championed social issues with their evocative prints, Lu Xun promoted this new art form using an established Chinese medium but incorporating stylistic elements of the European woodcuts. Eventually, however, some artists noticed that the intended audience of these woodcuts, the ordinary Chinese citizens, found the style of these new woodcuts too unfamiliar and alienating. Gu Yuan’s print, Marriage Registration, demonstrates a return to traditional Chinese styles that mark the beginning of the socialist period, announced by Mao Zedong in his influential “Talks at the Yan’an Conference on Literature and the Arts,” which set the aesthetic standard for years after (see Appreciation).

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One way to understand how woodblock prints have been appreciated during the 20th century in China is to consider the subtitle of China Institute’s Fall 2010 exhibition, Woodcuts in Modern China 1937-2008: Towards a Universal Pictorial Language—by aspiring to move “towards a universal pictorial language,” what were the artists trying to articulate in their images that ostensibly speaks to everyone? In other words, what is universal about these woodblock prints? And how is the medium of woodblock print related to the universal aspiration of speaking in a pictorial language immediately understood by all?

By putting the modern Chinese woodcut movement of the 1930s and early 40s in relation to other progressive international print-revival movements that took place throughout the world in the early part of the 20th century, we can begin to explore this idea of universality. The images created in China in the 1930s and 1940s are roughly contemporaneous happening in Europe, Japan, and the Americas, and thus these Chinese woodcuts are staking a claim to the title of “modern”; the stark black-and-white woodcuts depicting human deprivation and an urgent need for popular resistance are radically different from traditional woodblock print culture in pre-20th century China (such as traditional nianhua prints—see Material Culture section) and share much more in common with the suffering peasants and workers depicted by such renowned European modern woodcut artists like the German Käthe Kollwitz and the Belgian Frans Masereel.

Li Hua’s 1936 print China, Roar! is one of the most iconic images from the modern woodcut movement in China. The allegorical everyman depicted naked, bound, and blindfolded in the print can only scream out in rage at his seemingly hopeless situation (although he seems just on the verge of grabbing a nearby knife which almost glistens with hope in the bottom corner) and the title clearly intends for the viewer to associate this one man’s fate with the fate of the nation. Putting this image in relation to one of the most recognizable classics of European Expressionism, Edvard Munch’s The Scream (1895), once can see that while the two prints were created at different historical moments in very different cultural settings, the two images nonetheless clearly share a common pictorial language that transcends their specific cultural context. This is not to deny that Li Hua’s image also speaks to a very specific audience (the Chinese nation on the eve of full-scale war with Japan), but to show the universal pictorial aesthetic the modern woodcut movement took as inspiration and carried even further.

Even as the modern woodcut movement aspired to speak a new “modern” language that could mobilize masses, it also used a pictorial language that many Chinese folk might find unsettling and alienating. Woodcuts in the 20th century took another interesting move once many of the woodcut artists joined the Communists in the Yan’an base after the Long March. Yan’an was the site where Mao Zedong delivered a very important speech in May, 1942, called the “Talks at the Yan’an Conference on Literature and Art.” In this very important talk that would shape the Communist Party’s attitudes towards writing and art for the next four decades, Mao insisted that art should reflect the values and forms of workers, peasants, and soldiers. If the modern woodcut movement prior to this aspired to a universal “mass art” (dàzhòng yìshù 大众艺术), Mao wanted an art that was for the masses (wèi dàzhòng 为大众). The CCP party eventually institutionalized cultural production to be subordinate to the ideas articulated in Mao’s “Talks at Yan’an.”

For woodcut artists, this meant returning to traditional folk art styles but changing the content to reflect new Socialist values. An ordinary peasant would immediately recognize and be able to “read” an image such as the typical door god woodcut such as the Lamp Lighting Daoist Door God. Following Mao’s theories laid out in his “Talks at Yan’an,” a woodcut artist such as Yan Han could masterfully retain the symbol of protection peasants used door gods for, but transform the door “god” from a Daoist immortal to a communist soldier in his New Year Door Guardian: A People’s Fighter—Cooperation between the Army and the People.

This socialist realist legacy is related but distinctly different from the earlier realist aspirations of the Modern Woodcut Movement. What both aesthetic styles aspire to, however, is very similar: reaching a mass audience in an effort to mobilize them to effect social and political change. As an artistic medium, woodblock prints seem optimally designed for this aspiration—the medium lends itself to multiple prints for wider distribution and it does not require a high degree of literacy (as compared, say, to calligraphy for example). This may be partly why woodcuts are a favored medium for achieving a “universal pictorial language,” even if the color and texture of that picture changes from period to period in 20th century Chinese woodblock art.

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Considered the founder and one of the most brilliant writers of modern Chinese literature, Lu Xun’s short story Diary of a Madman (Kuángrén Rìjì 狂人日记) set the precedent for the accepted use of the vernacular (báihuà 白话) in Chinese literature. Lu Xun was born in 1881 to an educated family in Zhejiang province, but a bribery scandal involving his grandfather, combined with his father’s prolonged illness from tuberculosis, meant that Lu Xun’s childhood was beset with hardship and financial difficulty. Spurred by his father’s illness and eventual death and harboring a particular mistrust of the traditional Chinese medicines that could not save him, Lu Xun went abroad to study medicine in Japan in 1904.

It was in Japan that Lu Xun had his political awakening. He was appalled by an image from the Russo-Japanese War, in which apathetic Chinese onlookers watched as their compatriot was executed for allegedly spying against the Japanese. Lu Xun decided that what his countrymen needed most was a cure not for whatever physical illnesses they might have but for their spiritual malaise. He dropped out of medical school and began to write and translate, focusing on the Confucian family structure and other aspects of traditional Chinese society he believed to be detrimental.

Like other May Fourth era writers, Lu Xun saw his works as a way to alert his countrymen to their dire condition, in hopes that they might then free themselves from the yoke of traditional society by breaking down hierarchies of age and gender and embracing Western-style modernity. The newly-formed Communist Party of China courted these writers and artists, arguing that Marxist ideology provided the necessary framework for strengthening China. While decidedly left-leaning, Lu Xun never joined the party, and in fact sought to distance activist groups he was involved with, like the League of Left-Wing Writers, from the nascent party structure. He expressly disagreed with the notion that literature should be created for propaganda purposes, and believed instead that it should ‘flow naturally from the heart with no regard for the possible consequences.’ (See: 1927 Huangpu Military Academy Speech)

Through his work organizing artists and writers, as well as founding a number of publications, Lu Xun became interested in woodcuts as an inexpensive and vernacular form of art that could carry critical cultural and political messages in visual form. He was heavily influenced by German and Japanese artists and organized exhibitions of their works in China. In 1931 Lu Xun organized a group of students and artists for a printmaking workshop held by the Japanese artist Uchiyama Kayoshi, kicking off the beginning of the modern woodcut movement in China. Lu Xun believed that while it was important to learn from foreign woodblock print styles, Chinese artists should seek to create works that spoke to the Chinese condition and were informed by traditional Chinese printmaking styles as well. This gave birth to the stark black and white images of early Chinese woodcuts, which sought to highlight societal wrongs and incite a call to protest.

Lu Xun died in 1936 and did not live to see the founding of the People’s Republic of China. The Lu Xun Academy of the Arts was founded in his honor in 1938 with a mission to train and nurture the talents of young artists, particularly in support of creating art for political propaganda. The Lu Xun Academy was the site of the Yan’an talks in 1942 (see History), in which Mao declared that the purpose of art was primarily to promote a political agenda, and later woodcuts took on a more social realist style. Lu Xun’s patronage of 20th century woodcut art is evident in such works as Song Guangxun’s Brave Chinese Women (Portrait of Lu Xun), created in 1974.