Site 1, July 1-7, Ruijin County, Jiangxi Province

History
In 1921, when the Chinese Communist Party was formally organized, it took the Russian revolution as its formal model, focusing on organizing urban workers. The Communists viewed themselves primarily as a reform party that could effect societal change through peaceful means. Establishing military power was therefore not a part of their initial agenda. The Communists quickly suffered the consequences as the ruling Nationalist government cracking down on their activities. Defeated, the Communists were forced to go underground in foreign-controlled Shanghai. It was at this time that Mao, unsatisfied with the urban insurrection policy guided by the Comintern's representatives in the Communist headquarters in Shanghai, began to organize peasant revolutions in the mountains. He believed that a Chinese revolution could only succeed if initiated by a peasant rebellion. Through building up small, rural soviets and encircling the towns and cities, he believed that the Communists could slowly take over the population centers, systematically establishing a larger base until becoming powerful enough to take over the entire country. In 1929, Mao's followers from the “Autumn Harvest Uprising'” joined together and began forming the Red Army, enabling him to successfully build the Jiangxi Soviet. Mao's theory of the rural soviet movement, his integration of Marxist-Leninism with Chinese reality, revived the Communists' difficult struggle in the urban area.

Throughout the course of Chinese history, peasant uprisings had repeatedly played a major role in the overthrow of ruling dynasties. Mao and his followers were thus looking to China's past for direction to its future. “The Sharing Wealth Party'” – the literal English translation of the Communist party's name, appropriated the slogan “The Wealth must be Shared” from the Taiping Movement (a movement which had combined a peasant rebellion with Christian belief and at one point had taken over half of Southern China. By 1853 the rebellion was powerful enough to establish a capital in Nanjing). The Taipings were eventually suppressed by the imperial government and the foreign powers that shared interests in China, thereby 'postponing' the Chinese Revolution for sixty years.1

From a Dialectical Materialist model focusing on the "moments" of revolution, it is extremely important to correctly understand the specific stage of development of the society facing crisis and the historical stage of that class which might be the class of revolution. To the Stalinists, China was a Feudal Society, but to the followers of Trotsky, the Chinese Capitalist class had already emerged and therefore the task of revolution was to counter the capitalists. To Mao, China was a semi-colonial and semi-feudalistic society. Mao writes, “The Chinese bourgeois-democratic revolution is in essence a peasant revolution...the basic task of the Chinese proletariat in the bourgeois-democratic revolution is therefore to give leadership to the peasants' struggle.”2　Combining Marxism-Leninism and the Chinese tradition of peasant revolts, Mao's principle contribution to Communism was the proof that in semi-feudal, semi-colonial countries such as China, a revolutionary Leninist Party could successfully carry out revolution and remain Marxist without relying on the proletariat.

Notes

1 In 1934, the defeat of the Jiangxi Soviet by the National army with the support of its German advisor, Nazi General Von Falkenhausen, similarly echoed the role of Captain Charles Gordon of the Royal Engineers, who aided in the final defeat of the Taiping movement.
Vincent Yu-chung Shih, The Taiping Ideology, University of Washington Press, Seattle, 1967.

2 Trans. Dick Wilson, Selected Works of Mao, vol. 1, Peking, p. 190.

3 Leon Trotsky (1879-1940), Russian Marxist theorist and revolutionary. With Lenin in hiding, Trotsky was the general in charge who successfully directed the masses of workers and soldiers in the October revolution, the second part of the Russian Revolution. He is credited with creating, inspiring, and directing the Red Army that won the civil war and preserved the revolution.

Trotsky was second only to Lenin in the Politburo. After Lenin died, he lost power in a struggle with Stalin and was exiled. Trotsky spent the rest of his life seeking a safe place to compose his critiques of Stalinist Russia. Living in Turkey, France, Norway, and finally Mexico, he produced a flood of publications and searing articles on the major issues of his day (Stalinism, Nazism, Fascism, and the Spanish Civil War). A Stalinist agent fatally wounded Trotsky on August 20, 1940, in Coyoac, Mexico. He died the following day.

Reading: Post-Marxist theory, Jacques Derrida's The Specters of Marx and Leon Trotsky's Problem of Chinese Revolution3 which Trotsky began writing in Moscow but finished in exile in Alma Ata and Turkey. In the realm of Chinese politics, Trotsky was the most criticized Communist. From the 30s until recently, being a Trotskist was equivalent to being dead in Chinese political life. Trotsky's writing is no longer banned, but few in China have interest in reading his texts. Are Maoism and Stalinism orthodox Marxist communism? Has communism failed, as it is said?

Show: Jean-Luc Godard's La Chinoise of the 60s in the yard of the Red Army headquarters where the Long March began in 1934. La Chinoise has never had much visibility in the Chinese art circle, not to mention the general public. The juxtaposition of the screening of this particular film, one that glorifies Mao's revolution from the perspective of idealistic French youth, to those who lived the reality of the actual revolution, and the meaning implicit in the location of the screening might together intrigue the viewer and generate contextualized discussion.

Discuss: Vladimir Tatlin's The Monument to the Third International (a slide of the drawing) and Dan Flavin's Homage to Tatlin (slides of the drawing and neon installation) with locals and tourists. Tatlin's Monument was a celebration of the Comintern, which was responsible for the decisive defeats of the Nationalists' campaign against the Jiangxi soviet, thereby causing the Red Army to retreat and eventually embark on the Long March. Expand discussion to the dream of internationalists “Utopia” and monument building, in connection with the new Chinese dream of a “Socialist Market Economy with Chinese Characteristics,” and the loss and gain inherent in this process.

Site Specific Works

Xiao Xiong, China
Performance: Throughout the three-month Long March Project, this artist will travel with the curator, cameramen and other artists constituting the core of the Long March team. His project will engage in a repeated process of reciprocal exchange with those encountered along the road. This project will start with the exchange of a small porcelain statue of Mao, the likes of which are ubiquitous throughout China. There will be no limitation on what is given in exchange with the exchange itself forming the initial underpinning of not only material but also social relations, a relation to be continued in a long-linked process of reciprocity along all 6,000 miles of the Long March. The devaluation or evaluation of the object in this process of exchange will be documented daily in the different geographical and societal locations.

Song Dong, China
Performance: The artist will carry a mobile video projector to continually project the moving image of a massaging hand on the audience's face and body, on both ritualistic and secular spaces. He has performed this work at the ICA in London and the Shanghai Biennial.

Site 1 - Ruijin, Jiangxi Province
On June 28th, the Long March's curatorial team boarded a T106 train from Beijing headed for Ganzhou. The preparation for various projects began immediately after the arrival in Ruijin on the 29th, marking the official commencement of the Long March Project. Sculpture works by Zhan Wang, Fu Xinming and others had already arrived at the Yeping Revolutionary Memorial site, and were waiting to be unpacked. Joining the march from Fujian province, the photographer father and son, Li Tianbing and Li Jincheng, started installing their exhibition. Local organizations, including the Ruijin Municipal Party Committee of Propaganda, the Cultural Associations and Bureaus all showed enthusiastic support for the project. The four Associations of Artists, Calligraphers, Musicians and Dancers under the Cultural Bureau had each proposed a program for the Long March.

Simultaneously, projects initiated by Qiu Zhenzhong, Shi Yong, Song Dong, Yin Xiuzhen, Wang Bo, Qu Guangci, and Wang Jinsong, were to continue to evolve throughout the entire Long March Project, without the actual presence of the artists.

Xiao Xiong, Shao Yinong, Mo Chen, and others planned to depart soon for their own Long March, traveling a different route from the main contingent.

July 2
15:00. The first event of the Long March project, The Red Earth: Discussion on Revolutionary Paintings was co-organized by the Artists' Association of Ruijin and the Long March curatorial team in the Ruijin Youth Cultural Palace. Prints and oil paintings of historical and revolutionary subject matters created by artists of the Ruijin Artists’ Association were exhibited. Juxtaposed with these works were reproductions of Chinese ink paintings portraying the scenery along route of the Long March, which the curatorial team had brought over to Ruijin. Ten directors from the Artists’ Association joined the discussion. The chairman of the local Artists’ Association gave a detailed introduction about the making of the mural in the Ruijin Hotel, entitled The Dawn of the Red Capital. His introduction was followed by a fervent discussion among all participants about the relationship between the revolutionary subject and the professional requirements of such a painting itself. During the discussion, every participant recalled important historical documents, such as the Yan'an Talks on Literature and Art by Chairman Mao, and Why I Joined the Communist Party by Picasso.

July 3
10:00. Two important programs opened at the Yeping Revolutionary Memorial Site in Ruijin for the Long March Project: the exhibition of sculptural works by Fu Xinming and Zhan Wang, and the father and son photography exhibition by Li Tianbing and Li Jincheng. Eight sculptures and new installation works by Fu Xinming, which used tree roots as the primary medium, were placed in various areas along the Yeping Memorial, covering both indoor and outdoor space. Zhan Wang's stainless steel imitation ornamental rocks were installed on the lawn across from the site where the first Soviet Congress was held, now referred to as "The Cradle of the Republic," drawing great interest from numerous tourists. Li Tianbing and Li Jincheng exhibited their works at the site of the former Central Post Office. Tourists visiting the Yeping Memorial showed deep interest in the unique old-fashioned photography methods employed by Li Tianbing, who was asked repeatedly for his autograph. Afterwards, the photographer held an on-site photo shoot, generating a lot of enthusiasm among onlookers.

Afternoon. The exhibition of globes by U.S. based German artist Ingo Gunther took place at the original site of the former Provisional Sino-Soviet Central Government, in a small square in front of the front gate of the Ruijin Shazhouba Auditorium, commonly referred to as The Octagon. Shazhouba Auditorium was designed by Qian Zhuanfei, and its shape is modeled after the form of the "Eight Cornered Hat" of the Red Army. Its main gate, where the influence of Cathedral architecture is apparent, bears a three-dimensional sign of the Sino-Soviet national emblem, embodying the world consciousness held by the founders of the republic in early years. This was also the reason behind the curatorial decision to show Gunther's series of map works here. The exhibition was held using a unique method of temporary exhibition. Eighteen villagers from Xiejia Village, Ruijin, held Gunther's works up with their hands, lining up in a row, presenting the works to the audience, comprised mainly of tourists visiting the revolutionary memorial sites. With a request from the audience, Qiu Zhijie gave a lecture on the concept of Ingo Gunther's works and on the significance of presenting them at the auditorium

July 4
10:00. The Exhibition of Works by Ruijin Photographers' Association opened outdoors in Red Square, the busiest section of Ruijin town. More than one hundred pieces, reflecting urban construction and local customs and scenery, were on exhibit. Li Tianbing and Li Jincheng made a visit to the exhibition space. In the afternoon, local photographers also visited the Yeping Memorial to view their works, leading to an enthusiastic and warm exchange between local hosts and visitors.

Assuming the name “Qu Guanci,” the executor of the project Who is the Third Party?, proposed by the Shanghai-based artist Qu Guanci, reported his arrival in Ruijin to the main contingent. Employed by Qu Guanci, and using his identity, this individual will continue to appear during the whole process of the Long March. According to the contract between them, "Qu Guanci" will carry a soft sculpture figure of the real Qu Guanci, keeping it close to him for the duration of the march. He will also be responsible for carrying out another work by Qu Guanci entitled The Model of the New Long March. In addition, the organizing committee has assigned "Qu Guanci" to assist in Qiu Zhenzhong's work Signature as well as works by Song Dong and Yin Xiuzhen. Along the route of the Long March, he will try his best to collect as many signatures as possible from various people. Qiu Zhenzhong will turn the collected signatures into a work in the end. At every site, "Qu Guanci" will also be searching for an individual suitable for Song Dong's project by taking pictures of their face with a Long March brand automatic camera. These rolls of film will be collected afterwards by Song Dong, who will then complete the work. "Qu Guanci" will also be responsible for collecting used clothing for Yin Xiuzhen.

July 5
In the exhibition hall of the third floor of the Ruijin Cultural Center, The "Three Nine" Exhibition of the Ruijin Calligraphers Association, an art event of the Long March organized in cooperation with a local organization, opened in grand-style. Many of the contents of the works on exhibit related to the Long March. The comrades of the Ruijin Municipal Party Committee of Propaganda and the Cultural Bureau visited the exhibition and participated in Qiu Zhenzhong's Signature project, signing their names enthusiastically with a brush.

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