Art, nature and society in contemporary China

This online specialist short course will offer you an ecocritical approach to contemporary Chinese art.

It will examine how art intersects with the current socio-political climate in China and explore how perceptions of the natural and human environments have been visualised and have changed in relation to destruction, economy, society, politics, ethnicity, consumption and taste.

You will first take a look at how artists have aestheticised ecological decay by drawing on Chinese pictorial traditions in relation to the philosophy of nature, or ziran in Chinese. You will then turn to how artists and curators rethink the representations of waste in exhibition spaces. To effectively mobilise public participation in socio-environmental transitions, participatory art has been created to transform the power of art into action. 

The rise of digital communication via the internet and social media enables the wider public, including the Chinese diaspora, to engage with social, political and environmental issues. You will end with how international artists and designers have undertaken creative projects to achieve environmental sustainability.

This eight-week course, given by art historians, curators, artists and sociologists, is designed for those interested in how nature and society have informed artistic practices. You will encounter a broad range of paintings, installations, landscape architecture, performance art, digital media and curatorial practices within socio-environmental contexts in China and identify the key debates associated with these subjects. Contributors to the programme will offer insights on various topics across art historical and geographical boundaries from an interdisciplinary perspective.

This online short course is offered by the SOAS-Alphawood Postgraduate Diploma in Asian Art and convened by Dr Xinrui Zhang (Postdoctoral Research Fellow, Humanities Research Centre at the University of York).