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Long March Project ¨C The Great Survey of Papercuttings in Yanchuan County at the 27th Sao Paulo Biennale
October 7 ¨C December 17, 2006
Over a half year period in 2004, the Long March team, in collaboration with the local Yanchuan County government, surveyed over 180,000 Yanchuan County residents, collecting over 15,006 individual case studies and papercutting samples. The half year investigation has formed one of the largest archives of papercuttings to date, showing the development and changes of the medium and its vitality.
Yanchuan County is a papercutting county. It is not that there are 15,006 people who can make papercuttings, or, that of these, there a numerous artists who are very good. Rather, the Great Survey of Papercuttings in Yanchuan County is the first time a county has courageously and self-consciously initiated as thorough and comprehensive a survey as possible that was a cooperative effort between the county government, the general public, and an art activity/non-governmental organization such as the Long March. The survey and archive of 15,006 papercuttings works has entered into what has we have become accustomed to being the most important arena of contemporary art, the international art biennale. The project not only displaying works, but people, and their very lives and livelihoods.
This year¡¯s biennale entitled, ¡°How To Live Together¡±, is the first time the biennale will do away with so-called national representations, instead focusing on the autonomy of a conceptual project. The biennale sets out to explore questions revolving around contemporary art today, including the role of artist, the social nature of art, and the meaning of ¡°contemporary¡±.
As a source material, papercuttings can most strongly and effectively reevaluate tradition and modernity, art and life, individual and society, and inheritance and creation. Papercuttings are the simplest materials, the most direct form of transmission, the most abundant with regional characteristics, and the most filled with the power of individuality. They are the most subjective ¡°image,¡± as well as the most basic aesthetic expression. The papercuttings of the Sha¡¯anbei region are an example of the continual expression of the influence that the experience of the training and organization by professional artists from different historical periods have had on society. Today, in the wave of marketization and commercialization, papercuttings are searching for a ¡°survival¡± point. How is it that, such a subjective artistic method, can be one of the most stubborn remnants of an ethnicity, and what types of new explanation and practice can this provide for contemporary art? How can it forcefully reveal the particular characteristics, creativity, and unique social organizational structure of China in the international context? How can the visual cultural resources of the unique development of a Chinese ¡°path¡± provide an understanding and practice of the ¡°contemporary¡± for contemporary Chinese art?
The topic of the public nature of art must begin from the public realm. One county, one district, one village, one individual, this is the most basic unit of Chinese society. Very seldom do you have a country and an area with a unique social system that is capable of producing an endeavor like ¡°The Great Survey of Papercuttings in Yanchuan County.¡± The project is an artwork whose authors include, Lu Jie, the Long March Foundation, the 25000 Cultural Transmission Center, the Yanchuan County government, the 15,006 individuals who contributed to the survey, and the 170,000 who were surveyed but did not know how to make paper-cuttings, as well as a work produced by the ¡°Long March ¨C A Walking Visual Display.¡± At the same time, ¡°The Great Survey of Papercuttings in Yanchuan County¡± is a social project that mobilizes contemporary artists, grassroots cadres, and art officials to once again return to the villages, combining are with the methodologies of anthropology and science to conduct a comprehensive survey of the people from an entire county. Its result is a large-scale visual display of an analysis of the present state of folk art. It is both an artwork full of creativity, as well as a comprehensive report on the development of folk art. At the same time, it is also an example of a never before seen cultural and artistic cooperation between a folk art organization, such as the Long March, and a county government. This type of creative initiative, intellect, vision, organization, mobilization, and the power of implementation is a revolutionary action that builds subjective consciousness from the roots. Regardless if in the field of art or social sciences, the project continues the unification of theory and practice from which the Long March arose; it is the locating of art without borders.
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Long March Project
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Related Links:
The Great Survey of Papercuttings in Yanchuan County
About the 27th Sao Paulo Biennale
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