(In)visible Ink: gender and Chineseness in contemporary Chinese art

This thesis presents a critical examination of contemporary experimental ink practices (shiyan shuimo) and calligraphy (shufa) in the work of four women artists in the People’s Republic of China – Bingyi, Ma Yanling, Tao Aimin and Xiao Lu. The thesis highlights the gendered histories and nationalist legacies of ink painting and calligraphy associated with the literati tradition and with its post-Cultural Revolution reinventions. Three distinct strands of transcultural feminist theory are employed to provide a situated and intersectional interpretative framework: Qing Dynasty anarcho-feminist He-Yin Zhen’s gendering category of nannü; Ella Shohat’s notion of ‘subterranean feminisms’ operating in contexts outside Euro-America; and the ‘alternative’ feminist travelling and translation theory proposed by Min Dongchao. Through this framework the artists’ work is considered in relation to the broader discourses and practices of contemporary art in/from China (Zhongguo dangdai yishu) and the alignments and tensions of feminist theory and practice across cultures. The analytical methodology, informed by feminist art history and ethnography, is sensitive to the complexities of gendered life experiences of sexuality, fertility, intergenerational relations, domestic labour, menopause and aging, and the position of women artists in unequal structures and systems of power. Considering the four artists’ work in relation to these experiences, the thesis provides new knowledge and critical analysis of experimental ink painting/calligraphy and the under-recognised contribution of women artists to contemporary art in the People’s Republic of China. The artists’ work is interpreted as creating nannü spaces, from which women can actively shape practice, concluding that the materiality of their work, alluding to the masculinist history of literati painting, is central to an understanding of its counter-patriarchal force.

Grantor dc:publisher

UNSW, Sydney

Year dc:date

2022

Author dc:creator

• Guest, Luise ; https://orcid.org/0000-0002-9250-0939

• Contemporary Chinese Art
• Gender
• Feminism
• Feminist Art History
• Nannu
• Chinese Women Artists
• anzsrc-for: 3601 Art history, theory and criticism

Statement dc:rights

• open access
• CC BY 4.0
• free_to_read

Licence

• https://purl.org/coar/access_right/c_abf2
• https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

Language dc:language

en

Identifier

https://doi.org/10.26190/unsworks/24175

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:unsworks.library.unsw.edu.au:1959.4/100468