Jeanne Boden's Blog

panjiayuan 潘家园 antique market in beijing

90 years chinese communist party

peking university - 北京大学

The magazine Jiangsu Huakan 江苏画刊 featured the first independent Art exhibition 中国现代艺术展 held in Beijing in 1989. The symbol of the exhibition was the no U-turn. New developments in Chinese art had reached a point of no return. On the cover we see Li Shan's performance "washing feet". The exhibition was closed down shortly after opening up when artist Xiao Lu fired a gunshot at her installation. 

peking university - 北京大学

In the beginning of the 1990s I spent some time at the university Shaanxi Shifan Daxue 陕西师范大学 in Xian conducting research on contemporary Chinese literature. I absolutely loved the work of writers such as Su Tong 苏童 and Ma Yuan 马原. My research at the time focused on Ma Yuan, an amazing writer who I think was one of the most influential ones in the developments of contemporary Chinese literature. He was criticized and discussed over and over and over again in China but I think he never got the international attention he deserves.

In the months I spent between dusty newspapers and magazines, being the only foreigner at the library then, the smell of dust became quite familiar. I also remember very well how I used to love the music playing at the whole campus at certain times during the day. Until one day I realized how our lives at the campus were not only livened up but also controlled and organized by way of that music. When I tried to find out where it came from (I really loved it and I wanted to get a copy of it) no one could tell me who put it on or where I could find it. 

When I went to Peking University recently the smell and the feel of the dusty books catapulted me back in time. I was absolutely amazed to find exactly the same environment today as the one I had known a few decades ago. Modernization of China certainly left some places untouched. 

peking university - 北京大学

In the middle of the 1980s lots of new magazines and art publications were established, mirroring the lively discussions and creative art scene at the time. The most influential ones were Meishu Sichao 美术思潮 and Zhongguo Meishu Bao 中国美术报. Jiangsu Huakan 江苏画刊, was already founded in 1974 during the Cultural Revolution as a bimonthly popular art magazine. In 1985 it was transformed into a monthly journal with the mission to promote contemporary art in China. This shows that the coming into being of contemporary Chinese art in the 1980s was not something that solely happened outside the official establishment. 

a new book: on xinjiang this time

Very few books have been written about Xinjiang in northwest China, so I thought it was time to contribute a bit to the discussion of this largely unknown area. The book (only in Dutch for the time being) has more than 120 photographs that highlight this special area. Xinjiang is at the same time very Chinese and very different from the rest of China. 

The title 'Xinjiang: de nieuwe grens van China' or 'Xinjiang: China's new border' refers to the literal translation of the Chinese characters 新疆, but 'new' also refers to the recent economic development of the area resulting in a whole new Xinjiang with new infrastructure, new architecture, a new position between the central Chinese government and Central Asia.

The book is a continuation of the knack.be blog I had in the beginning of 2010. It will be presented by Academic and Scientific Publishers at the book fair in Antwerp (Belgium) on November 7 where I will have a talk with Professor Rik Pinxten.

My special thanks for the absolutely fantastic design of the book to David.

ChinaConduct project supported by Fonds Pascal Decroos.

 

and here is the english version!

As promised a few weeks ago: the English version of Mindmapping China.

More information on ChinaConduct.

here it is!

Here it is! 'Mindmapping China' After months of patience, my new book arrived today. The Dutch version lies here next to me. For the English version we still have to wait a month or so, we are still fine-tuning it but it is also coming!

Since language differences between western languages and Chinese have such a huge impact on working with China, I decided to write a book about it. Westerners too easily neglect the impact of language difference while working in China. They get used to working with interpreters and seldom seem to pay much attention to what gets lost in translation. It is somehow surprising - and one might raise the question of Eurocentrism here - how normal westerners find it not to make any effort to gain knowledge about the Chinese language, while it is not so difficult to gain a basic understanding of the language and the consequences of it in cooperation with China. 

Ironically enough, the very first business magazine journalist who had a quick look at the book came to the premature conclusion that only the 'Eight chapter' was 'useful for business people' (a chapter on making promotion in China and putting your product into the Chinese market), thereby again completely neglecting the goal of the book: introducing the Chinese language and its impact (to - among others - business people)!

More information on ChinaConduct.

the wall behind china's open door

For those of you who did not know yet, this is was my previous book in English: The wall behind China's open door, or 'what you need to know when working with China'. It was published in 2008. You can take a look inside on amazon. 

More information on ChinaConduct.

su tong 苏童

A few days ago Su Tong won the biggest literary price in Asia, the Man Asian Literary Price with his latest novel 河岸 'river and shore'. I have been a fan of his work since the very beginning. This picture was taken during Su Tong's recent residency in Belgium.