From Jean-Paul Sartre to Teresa Teng: Contemporary Cantonese Art in the 1980s

Jane DeBevoise will present her film "From Jean-Paul Sartre to Teresa Teng" at UC Berkeley.

Though the 1980s was a seminal period in the history of contemporary art in China, the contribution and experimentalism of the art scene in South China, particularly in Guangzhou and Shenzhen, have thus far been overlooked. Based on primary research, rare footage and personal interviews with key artists, this documentary film bears witness not only to the “Reading Fever” that gripped the Chinese art world in the 1980s, but also to the influx of popular culture such as Canto pop that flooded over the border to Guangdong from Hong Kong at the end of the Cultural Revolution.

From Jean-Paul Sartre to Teresa Teng highlights the experimentalism and vitality of artists, critics, and curators in South China during this time, including Hou Hanru, Wang Huangsheng, Chen Tong, Yang Jiechang, Wang Du, and members of the Big Tailed Elephant Group, including Chen Shaoxiong, Lin Yilin and Xu Tan, whose contributions to the development of contemporary art have been long lasting and deep.

Introduced by Julia White, Senior Curator for Asian Art, UC Berkeley Art Museum and Pacific Film Archive.