CHI225

Winnie-the-Pooh is blocked on China's internet after memes appear of President Xi and the bear walking side by side. A Chinese artist is held without charges and then welcomed by foreign hosts into exile. The Western media clings to a narrative of Chinese art as authoritarian critique, but this is only one aspect of a complex relationship between art and politics in Chinese culture. What does "censorship" really mean? What are China’s mechanisms of control? Is there Chinese art that is neither dissent nor propaganda? This course considers these questions through close analysis of China’s visual arts, theater, and literary texts.