Projects tagged "China"

Snake Ceiling
Practitioner:
Ai Wei Wei
Date:
Aug 17 2013
On May 12, 2008, a massive earthquake in China’s Sichuan province killed approximately 90,000 people. Ai Weiwei created this serpentine sculpture, made of backpacks, to commemorate the more than 5,000 school children who were killed when their shoddily constructed schools collapsed.
Free the Beijing Five
Practitioner:
Wang Man, Wei Tingting, Zheng Churan, Li Tingting, Wu Rongrong
Date:
Mar 6 2015
Nancy Lindisfarne and Jonathan Neale write: Five Chinese feminists have been arrested for planning to protest against sexual harassment. They face five to ten years in jail. This post explains the background to the case, and suggests ways that other activists around the world can show solidarity.
China's Underground Hiphop
Practitioner:
In3er
Date:
Jan 1 2008
China's underground hiphop became an art movement since early 2000s. With characteristics of self-expression, localization and social criticism, Chinese hip hop music quickly gained popularity among students and working-class Chinese. Some notable music groups from Beijing include Yin Ts'ang (隐藏) and In3er (阴三儿).
New Beijing, New Marriage: A Milestone Film in China’s LGBTQ Movement
Practitioner:
Fan Popo, David Cheng
Date:
Feb 14 2009
New Beijing, New Marriage is a documentary shot by Fan Popo, a Chinese gay rights activist in 2009. The film recorded that a gay couple and a lesbian couple, who were volunteers instead of real homosexual couples, were having their wedding photos taken at Qianmen Street on Valentine’s Day. Qianmen Street is a crowded and famous shopping street in Beijing.
Raise Your Umbrellas: How Denise Ho went from Cantopop queen to pro-democracy activist
Practitioner:
Denise Ho
Date:
Jan 1 2014
In Hong Kong in 2014 the song Raise Your Umbrella by Denise Ho and Anthong Wong became an anthem for the pro-democracy movement known as the Umbrella Revolution. The song was written after police fired tear gas into the crowds when protestors filled the streets.
Performance Art Feminism in Beijing
Practitioner:
Xiao Yue
Date:
Feb 14 2012
Xiao has organized and participated in a series of activities that combine performance art with a strong social message. Despite a well-known Chinese maxim expounding that women "hold up half the sky," feminism has largely been an underground movement in the country. Xiao and her cohorts' mission is to change that by taking up the cause in public, even if it means going to extreme and controversial lengths.
Taking Feminist Battle to China’s Streets, and Landing in Jail
Practitioner:
Young Chinese Feminists
Date:
Feb 2 2012
The young Chinese feminists shaved their heads to protest inequality in higher education and stormed men’s restrooms to highlight the indignities women face in their prolonged waits at public toilets.
Chinese AIDS activist Gao Yaojie
Practitioner:
Gao Yaojie
Date:
Jan 1 1996
Gao Yaojie (Chinese: 高耀潔, Gao Yaojie; 19 December 1927 – 10 December 2023) was a Chinese gynecologist, academic, and AIDS activist based in Zhengzhou, Henan, China. Gao was honoured for her work by the United Nations and Western organizations whilst spending time under house arrest.
Leftover Women
Practitioner:
SK-II
Date:
Apr 6 2016
They are disparaged as “free-willed” women, “stubborn,” “picky,” “incomplete.” But a video by an East Asian beauty brand that went viral over the past week has upended the conversation on China’s sheng nu, which translates literally into “leftover women” — those who happen to be over 27 and unmarried. “People think that in Chinese society an unmarried woman is incomplete. You feel like an outsider,” says one young woman.
In China, a Young Feminist Battles Sexual Violence Step by Step
Practitioner:
Xiao Meili
Date:
Sep 1 2013
A hundred days. That’s how long it took Xiao Meili to walk from Beijing, in the arid north, to the humid, central city of Changsha. Since September, the 24-year-old has been trekking south and west across the Chinese heartland, along rumbling highways, around construction sites, down dusty streets. She stops along the way to send letters to local officials. Her plea: China must change the way it handles sex abuse.
Gangnam Style Used in Protests in China
Practitioner:
Chinese construction workers in Wuhan, and people of Henan Provence
Date:
Jan 13 2013
In early January, constructions workers in Wuhan, China staged a Gangnam Style protest in front of their employer's building. Using the Gangnam Style dance, the men sought to bring media attention to their mounting unpaid wages.
Dystopian Noah's ark reflects China's environmental woes
Practitioner:
Cai Guo-Qiang
Date:
Aug 9 2014
A dilapidated wooden fishing boat laden down with animals who are just skin and bone, a sort of dystopian Noah’s ark trying to escape the end of the earth and an empty city devoid of human life that has been overtaken by nature.
China's censors tested by microbloggers who keep one step ahead of state media
Practitioner:
Weibo
Date:
Apr 15 2012
The Guardian By Tania Branigan In the opaque world of Chinese censorship, a few red lines shine through the murk. One of the clearest is: no gossip about top political leaders, their families or internal party affairs.
Future Vote
Practitioner:
Action Office
Date:
Jan 13 2024
This project is a participatory art action initiated by the Action Office in 2024.
A Straight Journey: days and nights in their kingdom
Practitioner:
Masamojo
Date:
Apr 23 2015
A Straight Journey is a documentary of Chinese homosexual people. It is the first time for Chinese gays and lesbians to make their debut and speak out via one of the largest Chinese Internet service providers. Two Chinese photographers Masa and Mojo took a journey across 11 China's cities making portraits of 48 gays, lesbians and their families from 2014-2015.
"Goo Phone" Chinese Company Used Leaked iPhone 5 Specs to Build Knockoff, Hopes to Sue Apple for Patent Infringement
Practitioner:
Goophone Company
Date:
Sep 6 2012
Just the other day, we were hearing about Samsung getting in legal trouble over patent violations with Apple. A federal court decision ruled that Samsung owes Apple more than $1 billion in restitution.
Pork Bun Restaurant Turned Protest Site
Practitioner:
Chinese petitioners
Date:
Jan 4 2014
Chinese leader Xi Jinping’s latest attempt to cultivate his image as a man of the people is creating some unintended consequences. Qingfeng Restaurant, an unassuming local eatery where Xi ate a meal of pork buns, fried pig liver and vegetables last month, has since become a staging ground for residents to protest against their local governments.
I Have Never Eaten These Tiny Grapes by Zuoxiao Zuzhou: 'China's Leonard Cohen' Calls Out Political Corruption
Practitioner:
Zuxiao Zuzhou, Ai Weiwei
Date:
Jan 1 2013
Zuoxiao Zuzhou is a Chinese singer whose accented, croaky voice is hardly ever in tune. But for his fans he's the voice of a generation — one of the very few voices who dare to speak out. After a collaboration, Cowboy Junkies member Michael Timmins called him "China's Leonard Cohen."