“The decades-long research by Zheng Shengtian proves that Mexican and Chinese artists met and started an influential dialogue as early as 1956. This book of Zheng's intense, passionate work on Sino- Mexican art exchanges is key to preserving this important period of art history. This study will inspire future generations to continue learning and enriching the art world through such cultural exchanges, promoting mutual understanding in our dynamic communities.” —Dr. Jesús Seade, Ambassador of Mexico to China; former Chair Professor and Vice President, Lingnan University; and former Associate Vice President, Chinese University of Hong Kong, Shenzhen

“While Soviet-styled socialist realism generally dominates the developmental narrative of Chinese art after 1949 and the establishment of the People’s Republic of China, artist, curator, and historian Zheng Shengtian argues that the overriding influence of the Soviet model was not a foregone conclusion. In fact, significant numbers of high-placed artists and teachers were attracted to an alternative and more expansive definition of socialist modernism proposed by Mexican muralists who combined a desire to uplift the poor and oppressed with an embrace of indigenous forms, alongside Euro-American-inspired experiments in expressionism and abstraction. Based on newly excavated primary material, interviews with key participants, and his own lived experience, Zheng enriches the story of art in modern China, including the power and precarity of cross-cultural exchange. For anyone interested in the complexities of global art history and modern China, Sino-Mexican Art and Cultural Exchanges in the Twentieth Century is a fascinating and compelling read.” — Jane DeBevoise, Chair Emeritus of Asia Art Archive in Hong Kong and Chair of Asia Art Archive in America

“The compelling story of how Latin American artists captivated the hearts of young painters in 1950s China and stimulated a late twentieth-century rebound in mural painting is little-known. This valuable account of events in the Chinese art world by Shengtian Zheng, who over his long career occupied central roles as artist, art teacher, arts administrator, international exchange organizer, editor, gallerist, and curator, is filled with rare first-hand insights. The book is particularly timely as it contributes to a growing body of research on cross-cultural artistic exchanges. It will therefore be of great interest to art historians and historians of China, of Mexico, of socialist movements, and of modern art in general. Furthermore, it answers some questions about why the official Chinese art world threw itself into a mural painting movement as it attempted to pull away from Soviet artistic models after the Cultural Revolution. This was not understood by Western observers (or many Chinese observers) at the time and is very illuminating. By joining contemporary Chinese and Spanish documents, recollections of fellow Chinese artists, and documents collected from surviving artists and their kin in Mexico, Chile, and Cuba to his own observations and reminiscences, he vividly presents an intriguing and important chapter in modern Chinese art history. Well written and well organized, this book will be of great interest to both general readers and the academic community." —Julia F. Andrews, Distinguished University Professor Emerita, The Ohio State University

Zheng Shengtian is the managing editor of Yishu: Journal of Contemporary Chinese Art, the adjunct director of the Institute of Asian Art, Vancouver Art Gallery, a research fellow at Simon Fraser University, and a trustee of Asia Art Archive in America. Dr. Zheng was previously a professor and department chair at China Academy of Art and a visiting professor at the University of Minnesota and the San Diego State University. He has organized and curated numerous exhibitions, including Jiangnan - Modern and Contemporary Chinese Art Exhibitions, Shanghai Modern, the 2004 Shanghai Biennale, Art and China’s Revolution, and most recently, Winds from Fusang: Mexico and China in the 20th Century. Dr. Zheng was the senior curator for Asia of Vancouver Biennale and won the Biennial Lifetime Achievement Award. Four volumes of his writings on art and culture have been published by China Academy of Art Press, and his artwork has been exhibited in China, USA, Canada, and Russia.

About the Translators

Shuyu Kong (PhD, University of British Columbia) is a professor in the Department of Global Humanities and co-director of the David Lam Centre for International Communication at Simon Fraser University, Canada.

Colin Hawes (LLB and PhD, University of British Columbia) is an associate professor in the Faculty of Law at the University of Technology Sydney.

List of Figures

Timeline of Chinese and Mexican Mural Art (1910–1979)

Introduction (Shuyu Kong)

Preface

Chapter 1 Lu Xun Introduces Diego Rivera

Chapter 2 Covarrubias Meets the “Shanghai Gang”

Chapter 3 Latin-American Art at the Asia-Pacific Peace Conference

Chapter 4 The 1956 Mexican Art Craze

Chapter 5 A Siqueiros Whirlwind

Chapter 6 Mexican Artists’ Travels in China

Chapter 7 Venturelli and His Mural Cienfuegos

Chapter 8 Rebirth of Murals in China

Appendix I: Interview with Yao Zhonghua

Appendix II: Interview with Yuan Yunsheng

Appendix III: Interview with Wang Qi

Appendix IV: A Conversation between Chinese Artists and Mexican Painter David Alfaro Siqueiros (October 1956)

Bibliography

Index