As a non-New Englander, I obviously do not follow Tom Brady on Instagram. But the folks over at Pats Pulpit do, and they uncovered a bit of news recently via the quarterback’s Instagram account: he’s in China right now promoting his Under Armour line of sleepwear.
And look, they managed to clear the Great Wall for him to take some publicity pictures:
Here’s Brady taking a selfie in his Beijing hotel room, which will be fawned over by thousands of Pats fans. (Pro tip for readers: don’t wade into the comments.)
The 798 Art Zone spans a quarter-square-mile area outside of Beijing’s city center, between the Fourth and Fifth Ring Roads. In other words, it’s on the periphery, much like contemporary art’s relationship with “normal” society in China. Indeed, contemporary art here does not operate within the government’s ideological agenda of promoting China’s rich cultural history, but instead attempts to remain beyond its grasp as a niche community .
On the surface, 798 appears to be a sprawling area of shops selling “Chairman Meow” prints and people posing for wedding photos next to graffiti or public artworks. But look closer and you’ll find more than kitsch and tourists. About 20 of China’s best galleries and museums for contemporary art are here, places that put 798 on the map in China and beyond.
Originally founded in the 1950s as an area of Bauhaus-style factory buildings for the production of military equipment, 798 was abandoned for decades before artists began using these large spaces for studios and exhibition spaces in the early 2000s. The conversion of factories into art spaces should sound familiar—it’s precisely what happened to Manhattan’s Chelsea neighborhood in the 1960s. Like its counterparts in New York, London and Berlin, 798 has grown as studios have given way to galleries and restaurants. And yet, 798 stands apart. While living costs have indeed driven some artists even farther into the city’s periphery, inflation hasn’t been nearly as drastic as in various Western art hubs.
I usually spend five days a week in 798 behind my desk, but for this piece I thought I’d venture outside and make the rounds for a day.
Entering from the west gate, I see a huge line of maybe 100 people (not abnormal in China) encircling a central square. The Japanese art collective teamLab’s exhibition has just opened at Pace Beijing, and its “digital playground” is attracting the mass audience that the artists aim to reach. At 100 RMB (15 USD) per ticket to visit a commercial space, I’m not willing to queue up in the summer heat, but I enter the square anyway to appreciate the exceptional vantage on 798’s most interesting buildings and public artwork.
Encircling the queue are some of the last remaining Bauhaus-style factory buildings, their designs replete with alternating geometric forms and large skylights along their roofs. Installed at the square’s center is an airplane wing — a work by Xiamen-born French contemporary artist Huang Yong Ping. A life-sized reconstruction of the US spy plane that collided with a Chinese fighter jet over Hainan in 2001 and was forced to land, then sent back to the US in parts, the Bat Project has been censored in all three of its iterations. And yet, “Bat Project III” was, somehow, later installed here in 798, where it remains to this day. Finding Huang Yong Ping’s work in China isn’t easy (as you can imagine), but he’s often foregrounded in exhibitions abroad. For instance, the Guggenheim’s upcoming show of Chinese art – Theater of the World – is named after his work.
There are hundreds of art spaces in 798, and they run the gamut: some display tacky ink paintings, others participated in Art Basel. Over the past couple of years, the number of the latter has increased, with spaces like Platform China and Urs Meile moving over from Caochangdi (the less commercial art district housed in a compound designed by Ai Weiwei, just 10 minutes away from 798). The first Gallery Weekend Beijing (modeled after the Berlin event) in March neatly brought together 798’s best galleries and gave them a juried prize as incentive to mount their best exhibitions.
I usually hit up Long March Space and Boers-Li Gallery, both of which have exhibition programs of the most historically significant and/or internationally renowned Chinese artists. I also like to go to spaces for young/experimental/emerging artists. Magician Space is my pick today for its exhibition of works by the artist Liu Ding and poet Han Dong. Based on their longtime friendship, the show juxtaposes poems with images that interweave phrases of text. The works strike me as exemplary products Beijing’s artistic scene, with its circles of writers and artists who exchange reading material and experiment with intellectual cross-pollination.
Liu Ding, A Day, 2017, mixed media, dimensions variable. Courtesy of the artist and Magician Space
After seeing a few shows, I am ready for a cup of tea. I head to TeaHere, a teahouse that opened in the fall and is run by the artist Wang Guangle, gallerist Jiao Xueyang and curator Bao Dong. Entering it is like going to Kyoto: it’s obsessively Japanese in design. Their tea-for-two service is expensive, but they do have a 15 RMB iced tea. Installed around the small space are works by artists like Zhu Yu, Jiang Zhi and Liang Shuo – all of whom are “members” of the teahouse and come here to hang out.
Back in exhibition mode: it’s time for M WOODS and UCCA.
M WOODS was established by three young Chinese art collectors and opened in 2015. Its exhibition program thus far has brought works by exciting, big names from abroad, whose work would otherwise not be seen here. I’m waiting on the show of new media work by Chinese, European and American artists from founder Michael Huang’s collection, which opens at the end of June.
UCCA (the Ullens Center for Contemporary Art), located at the center of 798, is arguably the most influential institution of its kind in the country. In the past year, UCCA has mounted major exhibitions of works by William Kentridge and Robert Rauschenberg (figures familiar to MoMA and LACMA in the US). I choose UCCA to revisit its exhibition The New Normal, a group exhibition to survey the current landscape of contemporary Chinese art held once every four years. Unlike its precursors, this time a handful of the participating artists are not based in mainland China, giving it a much broader focus befitting of China’s increasingly globalizing society. My instant favorite is Sophia Al-Maria’s “Black Friday” (which I first saw at the Whitney Museum last summer);
Sophia Al-Maria, Black Friday, 2016, digital video projected vertically, color, sound, 16’36”. Courtesy of UCCA
Having worked up an appetite, I head to Timezone 8 for dinner. I see a handful of recognizable (some “famous,” ) curators and artists at the bar with Robert Bernell, the owner. Timezone 8 began as an art book publishing company in the mid-2000s that put out the most important catalogs at the time, before becoming a dual concept Japanese-American restaurant where the fish is incredibly fresh and happy hour drinks are 2-for-1.
With Black Bridge Art Village (Heiqiao) being destroyed and Caochangdi becoming quieter these days, the 798 Art Zone has once again been pushed to the forefront of Beijing’s art scene — one that, for the uninitiated, is one of the most exciting art scenes in the world.
I’ve got a China story to tell. It involves luck, chance, AIDS prevention education for Chinese Youth, chain-smoking Single’s Day revelers, punk rock and a decent 29th birthday party.
Like most good stories it starts with me in my parent’s basement procrastinating on Facebook trying to delay for another few minutes becoming an adult. I had three browser tabs open, two job boards and my newsfeed. Scrolling down I came across an old high school friend’s post. She was teaching in China. Her company was hiring foreign teachers. I messaged her. A day later I was Skyping with her boss. A day after that I was preparing to move to Beijing to teach English.
Fast-forward a year and I’m sitting in my 20th-story bedroom in the northwest corner of Beijing contemplating an entirely new phenomena: disposable income. For the first time in my adult life I had money to spend. Not a lot, but some. What to do? What to do? I’d promised myself if that fateful day ever happened I’d donate a portion of my income to charity. Still, something about that seemed limp to me. A few pennies in a bucket seemed futile in the grand picture. I wanted to make an impact, not a dent; or maybe I was back-peddling on my idealism. The question haunted me: how could I get the best value for my money? What organizations should I support? Where would my renminbi go furthest? Cynicism hugged me.
Then an idea hit. For years I’d spent my weekends hanging in the back of my musician friend’s shows. I thought that many charity organizations needed awareness and social support as much as they needed money. Real change took real connection, real events… what if I spent the money to organize a concert that could raise even more money than I spent? It was like an investment with no losers; plus there’d be a good concert, which is great. Win-win-win!
Emboldened, I created a WeChat group and invited the musicians, movers and shakers I trusted could make things happen. I pitched the idea of a huge music festival. Everyone agreed red tape would strangle the idea. Ryan, a talented musician, pitched the idea of a series of concerts and events across multiple venues. Sophie, a branding genius, came up with the name “Giving a Beat.” Dennis, a freelance Russian illustrator, drew up a logo. Ryan put me in touch with JP, another talented musician, in the process of organizing a charity concert at Yugong Yishan, the holy grail of Beijing venues. He’d never done anything like it before, neither had I, we clicked on the idea and were game to try. He looped me in with a number of bands that supported the idea. He had build a relationship with Bethel China, an amazing organization founded by two expat musicians, which works with blind or visually impaired orphans. They provide care, education and life-changing services. Check them out. They’re awesome. The first show was in July and it was all in all a success.
Summer came and I left China for the US. When I landed back in Beijing I got in touch with JP and Steven, a local star and the lead singer of Steven & the Mac Daddies, about Giving a Beat. Steven organized a Christmas show and the proceeds were split with Bethel China and Agape Life House, a foster home for orphans with physical disabilities. (Side note: Agape Life House runs a wonderful bakery to support the organization.) The second show was smoother than the first. One high school class enthusiastically raised 4,000 RMB for the event. I got to hold a big check. I was learning more and more about charities in China and meeting inspiring people living in Beijing. Things were good.
It was time to raise the bar. It was time to attempt the impossible: a Temple Bar charity show. Charity concerts are common in Beijing, Giving a Beat didn’t invent the idea, but it was widely known in the music community that Temple doesn’t do charity shows. A challenge. I knew if it was going to work I needed the right cause. Through a translating gig I got connected to a big league organization, APEPCY, Aids Prevention & Education Project for the Youth of China, “Leading the Revolution of Philanthropic Organizations.” I pitched them the Giving a Beat model. They invited me to their office, an apartment converted into a bustling headquarters. I couldn’t believe they agreed to listen to me. I was talking about raising a few thousand RMB. They were raising hundreds of thousand of RMB through Tencent Giving on their WeChat platform. They had a budget of millions. They must have thought I was crazy. For 10 years they’d been changing the landscape of AIDS education across China. They were endorsed by the government, well staffed, well organized. This little Giving A Beat anecdote is a nothing compared with their story, which we’ll save for another time. Despite everything, they agreed to the show, and with their support I pitched the booker for Temple.
I could write about her thin back and the way her shoulder blades poked and stretched her skin and that coy, busy smile between small lips. Twelve men must fall in love with her a night. I could write about the men on the older side dressed like a Hell’s Angels JV squad making jokes at the bar, and my motor-mouthed diatribe on the necessity of rebellious art in an age of corporate politeness. I could write about throwing NGO brochures at Temple’s creative staff whom I cornered in the backroom, using the most of my powers of persuasion to say, These guys, yeah these APEPCY folk, they are the ones that are gonna make it. I could write about the lurching of the dancers and the shriek shriek anger-energy of the Chinese punk band. I could write about how they tore their shirts off and got on the table and flung their hair around honoring the gods of ’80s stadium hair metal and the demigods of ’70s London punk club gutter trash / fuck the queen / noise-music-fuck-it / we-all-die-simultaneous. Whatever happened, they agreed to let us set up a donation stand at the door (it was my birthday) and to give us the microphone for 10 minutes.
On the date of the show, 11/11, Singles Day, APEPCY volunteers showed up with red ribbons, a QR code and brochures. We set up shop in the corner and crossed our fingers. To this day I don’t know if the evening was a success or a massive failure. The Chinese bands seemed curious and grudgingly supportive of the idea. Before 1 a.m. concertgoers seemed genuinely interested. Sixty percent of the them threw a few RMB our way and got a red ribbon. Later in the night things got a bit sloppy. A drunken reveler almost knocked over the APEPCY representative as she told the story of the life-changing work their organization had done.
We didn’t raise much money. Still, it happened. Who knows? Maybe the butterfly effect will kick in. All in all it was one of my better birthday parties.
POSTSCRIPT: Giving a Beat is now an annual event. For those in Beijing, here’s the details for this year’s charity concert:
China Nights is a weekly series. If you have a story you’d like to share, please get in touch: [email protected]
Pictured: Richard Liu, JD.com’s CEO and founder, in 2014 (via China Daily)
China’s outside-the-box thinking has rewritten the book on e-commerce in a strikingly short amount of time. One complete game changer came from Alibaba Group, which is responsible for the explosion of the now-infamous “Singles Day” sale on November 11.
Singles Day (11/11 – all ones) has its origins in Nanjing college culture during the 1990s, but Alibaba took it to a new level in 2011 (11/11/11) when it initiated the Singles Day online sale, which has since grown into the largest online shopping day in the world. Competitors were quick to initiate their own sales, and leading rival JD.com responded with a holiday of its own – 618 Day on June 18, first observed in 2010 to celebrate the company’s anniversary.
Celebrities have gotten in on the act, such as Stephon Marbury, who was tabbed to make some special deliveries for customers in 2015:
During the month of June in the days leading up to the 18th, the company launched site-wide sales. Competing sites rolled out their own deals in response, a phenomenon that analysts note is to the benefit of China’s 1.4 billion consumers.
JD’s been seeing growth over all its diverse sectors (delivery of fresh grocery items, for instance), but its specialty is in consumer electronics. 6/18’s deals give the opportunity, if not the excuse, for China’s buyers to feed into their gadget desires.
“I’m buying bluetooth headphones, and an iPod shuffle,” says Thomas Lee, university student. “To me, 618 is like Black Friday. People save up for a long time to buy things they want, or just because the price drops.”
“618, the artificial holiday, is just like 11/11,” adds Ravan Liu. “Lots of big electronics brands have sales on this day. I mean, I know it’s a way of promoting themselves, but there are lots of things that are really cheap. Whatever I need, I’ll buy, as long as the quality’s good.”
Brian Ma, working at a digital advertising agency, spoke from the sellers’ perspective: “We have to promote this product that’s been out of stock, so we need big discounts and a lot of different platforms to promote it on. It’s a big opportunity to draw in revenue.”
In terms of impact, JD’s initiative with 618 day pales in comparison to Alibaba Group’s monstrous Singles Day, which last year shot sales up to 91.22 billion yuan of gross merchandise volume (GMV). JD does not reach comparable numbers, but did receive over 100 million orders during this year’s celebration. The holiday’s more modest results, though overshadowed by the pond’s big fish, nonetheless represent huge spikes in JD’s bottom line.
What’s more is that the growing number of initiatives like this is an important sign in its own right. It’s an indicator of the competition within China’s e-commerce industry, and of the sales innovation that’s taking place there. Not to be forgotten are the consumers themselves, a huge force of the population who are only further empowered by the sales, across all sectors of their lives. That’s indeed something to celebrate.
People are calling Stephon Marbury’s Chinese movie trailer “terrifyingly intense” and “super dramatic,” but judging by what I know of the Stephon Marbury story and the Chinese Basketball Association (CBA) in general, there might be a more appropriate description: pretty accurate.
First, go watch the trailer for My Other Home (the Chinese title translates literally to, “I Am Marbury”). As Slamrightfully notes, “looks like the movie’s going to be legitimately good.” Look at the crowds chanting, the crying, the on-court brawl. Look at Marbury slicing through the defense, seemingly un-guardable.
This all really happened.
You have to understand: Stephon Marbury, the Coney Island native and former USA basketball Dream Teamer, is without a doubt the greatest and most influential foreigner in the history of the Chinese Basketball Association. He led the Beijing Ducks, his CBA team of the last six years (before his unceremonious release this spring), to three championships, including their first in 2012. That year, he scored 52 and 53 points in back-to-back games in the semifinals against Shanxi. In that same series, he was (spuriously) accused of sending a fan to a hospital (“He got a wild imagination,” Marbury said), leading to a wild post-game scene in which Shanxi fans blocked the Beijing team bus. After winning the series in the final game — and being serenaded with MVP chants from his home crowd, causing him to shed tears — the Beijing Ducks would go on to face the Guangdong Southern Tigers, the team that had won the previous four CBA championships. (Think about that for a second, and how perfectly the Marbury-as-underdog story lines up here.) The series was marked by incredibly dirty play from the Southern Tigers, who must have known they would one day become movie villains, with Marbury being told “fuck you” by an opponent. But no one could stop Marbury that series. In the series-clinching fifth game, he scored 41, with seven assists to boot.
There’s so much more, including getting a book, a bronze statue, a postage stamp, honorary Beijing citizenship plus key to the city, and a finals MVP award in 2015 after leading Beijing to its second straight championship (and third in four years). Marbury received a Chinese green card last year. Do you have any idea how hard it is for foreigners to get one of those in China?
This was all for a New Yorker who washed out in New York, who was booed by his home fans, exiled from the NBA, and began his first season in China in the boondocks of Shanxi. Few stories feature the dramatic arc of this one, and it’s almost cliched: a man finding a new start half a world away; the redemption story ending in utter triumph; a forsaken man finding a new home in a foreign land. After his release from the Ducks, Marbury posted on his Chinese social media page (as spotted by Sports Illustrated):
I have not decided which team yet But there is one thing I’m 100% sure of no matter the team I play for the love between me and the club is always there, we will keep working with each other in the future. No matter where I am, I am a Beijinger. Beijing is my home forever.
There will be a full-length feature film about Stephon Marbury. I can only hope it’s as dramatic as real life.
Before fans began comparing her to Donna Summer for her wild tresses and unabashed voice, Zhang Qiang was a mere cover artist, singing Western disco songs that Chinese listeners barely knew. But through sheer talent and hard work, she made a name for herself. Her songs routinely became better received in China than the originals. In 1985, her debut cover album Tokyo Nights sold more than a million copies. She was only 18. In the three years after, she released 20 albums, including 11 in 1986 alone (still mostly consisting of covers of Western tracks). That year she became the first Chinese artist to be interviewed by TIME Magazine, which dubbed her “China’s Disco Queen.”
She produced “only” five albums from 1988 to 1992, and then promptly retired for the next four years. The music scene she’d attempt to return to, in the mid-90s, was radically changed, thanks to the emergence of Mandopop stars. And so, Zhang changed as well. Her 1996 re-debut album, Let’s Rock, featured only original songs. Her career as a cover artist was officially over.
And thank goodness, because otherwise we might not have gotten the catchy song “Beijing Girls,” with the zany accompanying video embedded above.
Released on May 20 of this year as her latest single, Beijing Girls has an instantly familiar retro beat and bouncy lyrics that wax nostalgic about Beijing. The girls in the video are played by native Beijing celebrities from different industries. If anything else sounds or looks familiar, it’s for good reason: the song samples from Prince’s “Kiss,” and the man in the video is clearly paying homage to Daft Punk. Horns and sax are employed in a way that reminds me of Bruno Mars’s Uptown Funk. If you sense other similarities to Western musical styles, it’s for good reason: Zhang Qiang, after all, grew up on this. But as a sign of an artist working at peak maturity, she neither steals from nor imitates those who influenced her – she merely borrows, producing a fusion that is all her own.
Yin (音, “music”) is a weekly Radii feature that looks at Chinese songs spanning classical to folk to modern experimental, and everything in between. Drop us a line if you have a suggestion: [email protected].
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