The Art of Revolution: Chinese Propaganda Posters

Shaomin Li, a painter by trade, received an assignment in 1976 that represented a turning point in his life. Having been drafted into the army, he was asked to paint a black and white portrait for Mao Zedong’s funeral.

Shaomin Li later attended school in the United States, became an advocate of democracy and free markets in China, and was imprisoned for six months in 2001 for speaking out against dictatorship in Hong Kong. The Old Dominion University professor offers glimpses of political and social realities over time in The Art of Revolution: Chinese Propaganda Posters from the Collection of Shaomin Li.

The exhibition includes more than 20 posters grouped by classic themes such as the Cult of Mao, Glorifying the Military, The Eight Model Plays, Everyday Heroes, Propaganda as Educational Material, and China after Mao. The Girl with the Red Lantern, for example, was among the most iconic and universally-recognized images in Mao’s China. Also included in the exhibition are Shaomin Li’s sketches related to his imprisonment as well as sketchbooks of military life and the model books he was ordered to use.

Credit: Exhibition overview from museum website

Whether or not you go, the accompanying book "Carry On the Revolution to the End"?: Propaganda Posters in China reviews the way in which art, in the form of posters, was used by Mao Zedong and the Chinese Communist Party to serve their revolution. It centers on the era of the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution (1966-1976) and discusses the way in which the revolutionary theory of art was formed and mobilized people to use posters to “carry on the revolution to the end,” as Mao called them to do. From the propaganda posters used during the Cultural Revolution, the author identifies the features of persuasion and distortion that are most common in these posters: they persuade people to do what they do not want to do, and they distort reality by showing the opposite. Based on his experience as an propaganda artist in Mao’s era, the author reviews the evolution of propaganda posters in China from the revolutionary era to today, and discusses what is at the “end” of Mao’s revolution – in today’s China.

Click to add this book to your library: "Carry On the Revolution to the End"?: Propaganda Posters in China