The China Project

165 Three Decades: The Contemporary Chinese Collection LUO Brothers Born in the remote and mountainous Guanxi Zhuang Autonomous Region of southern China and now based in Beijing, the Luo Brothers began their collaborative practice in 1986. The three brothers, Luo Weidong, Luo Weiguo and Luo Weibing, have rapidly earned a significant international reputation for their collages of computer-manipulated images. The Gallery’s six ‘Untitled’ works, in collage and lacquer on board, refer to late twentieth-century Chinese communist propaganda imagery, drawing heavily on the pre-communist traditions of the New Year picture or print ( nianhua ). These works also reference the global language of consumer capitalism, multinational companies and mass advertising that has effectively infiltrated Chinese cities and villages. The unique coalescence of imagery from these seemingly disparate ideologies highlights the commonalities in both forms of visual persuasion. The Luo Brothers extend these ideas by subtly disrupting the traditional symbolism and optimistic ideology essential to both the New Year prints and to socialist propaganda. Techniques of disruption include the barely noticeable limb deformations on some of the benignly smiling children, and a creative combination of the signifiers of mass marketing with traditional Chinese symbols. For example, Untitled (Baby and tiger) 2000 features three children riding or holding onto a running tiger — traditionally, the tiger represents courage and bravery. On their heads, the children wear lotus flowers (which symbolise purity), and hold two fast-food, ‘foot-long’ sandwiches. Untitled (Children with lemonade bottle) 2000 depicts five children riding a commercially produced lemonade bottle against a background of a rising sun and Tiananmen Square — itself a signifier of the tumultuous events surrounding the 1989 protests. Untitled (Kirin beer) 2000 has a baby girl holding Japanese Kirin beer marketing products. Within Chinese mythology, the qilin (Kirin in Japanese) is a creature described as having the body of a deer, the tail of an ox and the hooves of a horse, with a single horn on its head and a pelt of five colours. This creature, according to legend, refuses to step on living plants, will not eat a living thing, and is considered a harbinger of auspicious events — a bearer of good luck and fortune. Unlike the Kirin , the young girl featured in this image is blithely stepping on a rooster, the symbol of reliability. These collages are set against vividly coloured, patterned backgrounds. In three of the works, the rising sun appears in the background, quoting the visual iconographies of Pop art, Op art and geometric abstraction. Despite the artists’ subtle manipulations, these works by the Luo Brothers continue to emanate apparent exuberance and happiness — an essential and shared quality amongst kitsch Chinese New Year prints, socialist propaganda imagery and mass market advertisements — expressing a witty and comic irony in response to government officialdom. opposite Untitled (Children with lemonade bottle) 2000 Collage and lacquer on board / 65 x 55 x 2.3cm / Purchased 2001. Queensland Art Gallery Foundation above Untitled (Kirin beer) 2000 Collage and lacquer on board / 65 x 55 x 2.3cm / Purchased 2001. Queensland Art Gallery Foundation