Chinese Posters

"Dating from 1917 to the end of the Cold War, the posters in this book feature the work of such major Russian groundbreaking avant-garde designers as El Lissitzky and Alexander Rodchenko as well as extraordinary works by lesser known artists." --Book Jacket.

Introduction -- People, poverty, politics, and posters -- Nature and transformation -- Production and mechanization -- Women hold up half the sky -- Serve the people -- Solidarity -- Politics in command -- After the cultural revolution.

Provides an innovative reinterpretation of the cultural revolution through the medium of the poster -- a major component of popular print culture in China.

This book presents carefully-selected posters created from the 1950s to 1990s, and categorizes them into the following chapters: leaders, politics, International affairs, military affairs and national defense, economic construction, national unity, and cultural education. The characteristic artistic approaches in these posters will definitely provides readers with a unique reading experience.

Brightly coloured prints, portraying model behaviour or a better future, have been a ubiquitous element of Chinese political culture from Imperial times until present. As economic reform swept the People's Republic in the 1980s, visual propaganda ceased to depict the tanned and muscular labourers in a proletarian utopia, so typical of preceding decades. Instead, Western icons of progress and development were employed: high-speed bullet trains, spacecraft, high-rise buildings, gridlocked free-ways and projections of general affluence. Socialist Realism was phased out by design and mixed- media techniques that were influenced by Western advertising. This lavishly illustrated study traces the development of the style and content of the Chinese propaganda poster in the decade of reform, from its traditional origins to its use as a tool for political and economic purposes.

In 1966, when the Cultural Revolution took hold, posters, ceramic statues, "Little Red Books," and other material objects were the principal means that the Chinese government used to communicate with the masses. As art and as propaganda, the iconography of these artifacts was used to rally the people around the programs and personalities of the Maoist regime. For graphic artists, collectors, and Sino-historians, they have a growing importance. With nearly 500 color photos, this book is an introductory guide to the meanings and values of the material culture of the Cultural Revolution, along with brief explanations of their historical background.