Contemporary Chinese Art and Film: Theory Applied and Resisted

Publisher Marketing: In the past two decades, contemporary Chinese art and film have attracted a great deal of media and academic attention in the West, and scholars have adopted a variety of approaches in Chinese film and visual studies. The present volume focuses on the uses and status of theory originating in non-Chinese places in the creation, curating, narration, and criticism of contemporary Chinese visual culture (broadly defined to include traditional media in the visual arts as well as cinema, installation, video, etc.). Contributors reflect on the written and, even more interestingly, the unwritten assumptions on the part of artists, critics, historians, and curators in applying or resisting Western theories. The essays in the present volume demonstrate clearly that Western theory can be useful in explicating Chinese text, as long as it is applied judiciously; the essays, taken as a whole, also suggest that cultural exchange is never a matter of one-way street. Historically, ideas from traditional Chinese aesthetics have also traveled to the West, and it is a challenge to examine what travels and what does not, as well as what makes such travel possible or impossible. The present volume thus provides us an opportunity to rethink travels of theories and texts across cultures, languages, disciplines, and media. Contributor Bio:  Kuo, Jason C Jason C. Kuo teaches Chinese art at the University of Marlyland. He has held appointments at the National Taiwan University, Williams College, and Yale University. Among his publications are The Austere Landscape: The Paintings of Hung-jen; Chen Chikwan; Word as Image: The Art of Chinese Seal Engraving; and Art and Cultural Politics in Postwar Taiwan.