I last left you with street art in Wuxi and Shanghai, promising to write about the commercial art galleries in Shanghai.

Known as 50 Moganshan Lu or M50, I had expected a small collection of galleries.  After rallying her and her to join me for a wander, it became obvious M50 is an extensive creative park.

How apt that the map of the property also calls it a ‘creative park’.  The art galleries that were once factory spaces are a labyrinth, offering a variety of artistic styles — from oil paintings, to mixed media, pure photography or sculpture installations.

I sunk back into this environment with surprising ease, after being permanently scarred all those years, carted around by my ex as his art ‘wife’.

For a change, art and I were alone, without the pompous airs.  We lit candles to set the mood and held hands, which allowed me to make new discoveries about modern art in Shanghai.

Contrary to misconceptions about Chinese censorship, there seems to be a lot of freedom to express oneself.  M50 is accessible by taxi (not really metro) and prepare to spend a few hours walking and unearthing some hot and happening work.

My friends and I searched by instinct.  If an exhibition seemed worth a look, we went in.  You can also gauge a map for what might interest you when you arrive or research online.  There’s certainly no correct way to savior art, no matter what those pedantic art critics say.

I’ve chosen a few pieces and styles that really spoke to me.  Hope they do for you!

Portraits

From an exhibition called “We Are All Bachelors”, artist Wei Yi captured an ethnic minority group of men from a village in western China. The village has an interesting dilemma, there are very few available females in comparison to single men, which has left many males without wives or children at 40 + years of age.  Considering that all the buzz in China is about leftover women or  shèngnǚ, it was unusual to find spinster men. Wei captured their place in time and history with a haunting brush.

Wei also completed full size portraits of the lonely bachelors.

Wei Yi’s other work are in-depth perspectives on the daily lives of migrant workers and their families   How they exist, where they toil, and the sacrifices they make towards the urbanization of China.

Sculpture

As you wander around M50, you’ll notice various pieces of sculptural art.

Like this very industrial looking rhino:

Or this ambitious large scale one — gigantic man.  Mind the gap in his belly.

Still Life

I’m not one for this type of work, some have captured my eye in the past, but mostly I’m fairly neutral on this style.  But I quite fancied these!  They were sparse, yet evocative.

Post-Modern

I was absolutely enthralled with Qiu Shengqian’s oil paintings that fuse the futuristic with classic Asian images.  I was thrust into a new dimensional world of space alien geishas, punk rock emperors and ebullient Buddhas who mocked more than forgave.

A bit of mixed media action for you, this piece involved reclaiming old Chinese books and reforming them into a modern statement.  The exhibition –  ”Heritage” by Chen Linggang.

This one felt bizarro.  I kept picturing The Hanged Man card of a tarot deck.  This exhibition is “Tree of Man” by Mao Yu.

In divination, The Hanged Man can symbolize a life in suspension, which describes China’s face at the moment.  A country that has yet to complete its future.  Though the red ribbons imply blood flowing down.  What do you think?

Ceramics

I had no idea China had such a selection of ceramics.  Shows what I know.

These richly fired vases are from artist Liao Liao.

China has a sense of humor!  Pull the string and see what happens.

I envision a classy Chinese lady buying these as her wedding setting.  Porcelain with a blue pigment of cobalt oxide that’s generally applied by hand — very delicate looking.

Classical design.

These made me giggle.  Artist Dong Tao’s Chinglish tells us why she created these [typed as seen with spelling errors intact]:

“Everyone have their memories about the childhood.  The dream is the wonderful fantacy from maker, she desired to be companyed with huge rabbit, go around the world, to sence the beauty of nature.  Perhaps the innocent dream of childhood, is the realest about inside.”

I’d buy a rabbit based on that description alone!  But they go for 1,280 RMB, so maybe not.

Everyone should get their own Shanghai fan for 128 RMB.  All the hep cats are doing it!

Before you conclude that Chinese art is merely calligraphy and ink strokes of plum blossoms, Shangri-La mountain ranges and willowy women, visit Moganshan Lu to open your eyes.  You’ll find yourself reeducated, permeating with that art glow.

Glad I got mine back.

“You have to look at it as a piece of artwork.” — Twist, on graffiti

In art, there’s nothing if not drama.  After I revealed my tale of art woe…  The great love, the loss that tore my heart to pieces, until I finally recaptured the flame.  The time came to move towards bigger waters.  Shanghai.

I ventured on a rainy Friday afternoon to 50 Moganshan Lu, or known as M50, to feast on more artwork.

If you’re unaware of M50, it use to be an industrial area along Suzhou Creek, in the downtown district of Jing’an.  As the millennium unfolded, several Chinese artists found the large factory spaces and cheap rent appealing.  Today, the quarter of M50 is flooded by international visitors and locals, and was named a must-see part of Shanghai to visit by Time Magazine.

However, before I got to explore the commercialized art of M50, my curious nature couldn’t help noticing a series of spray painted walls.  Some of these walls housing nothing more than junk, replete with junkyard chickens.

Droplets of rain didn’t deter me from walking for several yards back and forth capturing some inventive street art.

You wouldn’t think such a nondescript street would have this, but as usual, China continually surprises me.

The street:

The chickens:

The art:

Either a Matrix tribute or Psy of Gangnam Style fame.  Since the damn song is played everywhere, it has to be the latter.

This one pulled me in by the collar.  What is it?  Can I go there and experience it?

Close encounters:

This piece reminded me of what all edgy graffiti artists do, tag to mark their territory and cement their fame.

A rich, multi-layered painting.  It was brilliant, masterful and spoke volumes about the exploitation of Chinese culture and the Panda.

I was so impressed with this work that I had to find out the culprits.

Go to Moganshan Lu, but also pay attention to the bubbles of inspiration at street level.  Creation is valid, whether gallery approved or not.

Me?  I’m a rebel.  You’ll always find me hanging with the downtown chickens and seeking new avenues of inspiration.

Will the gleamy art galleries of M50 deliver?  I was doubtful.  Stay tuned to find out!

Art is a bloated bag of bullshit. Pregnant with pretention, popularity competitions and false muses.  I gave it up officially in 2003 after a 10 year run.  After I left my ex.

My long term ex is a fine art painter.  He subjected me to Jackson Pollock smeared floors, the dusty smell of dried, caked paint hardening a litter of brushes, and that nasty substance known as paint thinner — noxious if I left the windows shut all day.

Not to mention art shows.  Attended by anorexic, existential depressives.  And those whinging milky art fags — you know who you are.  There I was, planted in a throng of pomp with a frozen smile chiseling permanent grooves in my cheeks, being dictated by the circus.  These shenanigans paralyzed any chance to absorb the talent surrounding me.

I grew tired of gloss instead of realism.  That the art world wasn’t about the work, but how well one could write a proposal for grants, flatter a gallery owner or edge out another artist.

Then I grieved.  Clutched a wine bottle, threw the covers over my head because deep in my sarcastic, flippant guts, I love art.  Art moves me.  Makes my mind swirl with possibilities.  The whys.  The big ‘yes’ of the universe.

Here I am in China teaching, writing, going about my life.  And believe it or not, besides attending festivals and skipping through gardens, I also do mundane things.

The latest mundane thing was going to my Chinese bank.  China is still in the thrall of a building frenzy, so across the street from my bank is an empty lot, where a building was bulldozed some months back.  A concerte fence surrounds the property to show the illusion of productivity   WE ARE BUILDING HERE.  STAY AWAY.

I seem to withdraw money frequently because over time the wall changed.  Week by week, panels of street art magically appeared.

I became obsessed with the wall.  Waiting for the next, next, next.

Until, I burst.  My roly poly art belly broke water.  Giving in, I ran across the street one afternoon and stared.  At every single detail.

[My favorite one.]

Close-ups.

My binds were released.  I spread my wings.  I could be the art viewer, instead of the art wife.

China bewitched me again.  To boldly display underground art, that’s not government sanctioned? To trump what so many fellow teachers say about China’s youth?  Creativity is continually suppressed; they learn by rote only.  THIS.  It was ballsy.  I wanted more.  In the upcoming weeks I’ll explore Shanghai for more street art and delve into the innermost chamber of the art beast –M50 on Moganshan Lu.

Me and art?  We’re good.  Back on speaking terms again.

There’s a reason why gardens are protected in the land of the dragon.  Amid continuous perceptions of China, you know which ones I mean… The indiscriminate spitting, a toddler relieving himself on the street, e-bikes nearly colliding with bodies, bone splinters in meat — need I go on?

See, in a Chinese garden you rarely, if ever, encounter such harsh truisms.

Gardens are the no-fly zone.  They are pristine.  Watered.  Tended.  Trimmed.  Workers are on hand around the clock to clean up debris, rake leaves and fertilize.  Everything is flecked with gold and wine porters all oiled up in tight-fitting loincloths fill up your empty glass!  Er.. scratch that.  Heh.  I get my gardens mixed up sometimes.

Back to Chinese gardens.

Why are they so important to the culture?  As a Chinese proverb says: “If you want to be happy forever, make a garden.”

Gardens were constructed for emperors, merchants, scholars, artists and writers.  Even the common man, by escaping to a public garden.  They are meant to be discovered slowly, over time.

I use to tutor a Chinese man who longs to travel and wanted to improve his conversational English.  Once, he and I were walking by a canal flanked with landscaping.  He pointed out a willow tree, and beside that, was a plum blossom tree.  Then he pointed out another willow tree, with yet another plum blossom tree, until I finally noticed the pattern.  ”In China, gardens are always done this way.  A willow tree and a plum tree together.”

With elements of rock, water, architecture (pavilions, temples, bridges, towers, galleries), flowers and trees, Chinese gardens symbolize harmony between man and nature.  A setting to re-balance, gain perspective and re-energize.

Even though everything [in the garden] is the work of man, it must appear to have been created by heaven.. – Ji Cheng, Yuanye, or The Craft of Gardens (1633)

With that paradise on earth notion, I sought out some nature at Méi Yuan Park in Wuxi.

See, in my China there are plum blossoms. Oodles of them.  Baskets teeming.  No car horns bellowing.  Some pretty things to gawk at.  Especially no spitting.  Give three feet of physical space, instead of one.  Walking without peering behind, left or right in fear of an e-bike hurling towards me, about to nick half my leg off.  Pathetic denial and utter unreality.  For about two hours.

That’s spring in China.  Enjoy the visual show!

Méi Yuan Park recycled some tires to use as garden decoration pieces. “Méi” is Chinese for plum!  You learn something new everyday.

I loved how vibrant the purple is!

People in touch with nature — a lovely sight.

Why do tulips make people giddy?

I’ve seen these same features in many Chinese gardens.  Arches constructed over stone-slab raised pathways.

Roses!  A classic.

A teaser…

I’ve held out long enough.

I must confess, not sure what these are, but does beauty need to have a name?

Back to why you’re reading this.

Another breathtaking setting.

I was quite enamoured with these — lightly brushed pink tones.

My friend pointed out these trees with the gnarled branches, a sculpture formed from Mother Nature.

More fascinating shapes.  Reminded me of druids! Very primal.

A garden is incomplete without daffodils.

Okay, to silence your whining, a few more.

You could see the plum blossoms as early as February, but I wouldn’t recommend seeing them in cold, crappy  weather.  Try mid-March until the end of April and you’re sure to see the blossoms, among other flowers blooming!  By summer, the trees lose their petals and the actual plums make an appearance.  Then you can visit again, steal some plums, and be chased off the property by Chinese security.

Happy plum blossom viewing!

“People tend to forget their duties, but remember their rights.” Indira Gandhi

Usually I comb through daily news items, share what’s interesting to me and then pay it no mind until the next round of perusing.  Sometimes a piece will jolt me, nearly make me spit out my morning tea.  A Guardian feature did just that a few days ago.

It set me on fire.  A controlled bonfire at first.  An incendiary headline can do it.

‘if girls look sexy, boys will rape.’  Is this what Indian men really believe? [1]

To answer the obvious, yes.  A journalist rounded up a sample of Indian men in Baga, Goa and interviewed them about their ideas and impressions of the fairer sex, to explain why the hell women in India keep being beaten and assaulted.

All eyes are on India now –scrutinizing a country that reportedly has some fucked up ideas on gender relations.

There was the beating and gang rape of Jyoti Singh Pandey, a 23 year-old medical student. Reports say she was with her boyfriend (or male companion, as some news agencies have called him), on a bus in New Delhi traveling home from the cinema when they were attacked by six men.  That was December 16th, 2012.  She died a few weeks later from her injuries.

By January 2013, two new rape cases were being investigated.  The first, a gang rape in Punjab, a north-western state.  The second, a woman who disembarked a train in Bihar (incidentally, a very conservative state) was attacked in a remote area.

Citizens worldwide were outraged.  Mass protests in major Indian cities sprouted, attended by female activists and supportive men.  Raging on the streets for change.  Hell yeah!  Say it, sistah!

Yet…

It’s a dim anger, almost background music in an elevator.  Present, but not penetrating.  Because in the darkest recesses of your mind, you think, I feel so much for these women. The rape laws in India must change, but thank goddamn, it isn’t me.  I’m safe.

What happens if that bonfire turns into an entire canyon being set ablaze and the bush fires are now beyond our control.  Flames licking at our heels.

Recent headlines from India are about the rape of a 39 year-old Swiss tourist.  She was cycling the country with her husband.  They camped for the night in Orccha (Madhya, Pradesh) when they were attacked by a group of men.  They beat her husband, restrained him, then took turns raping and brutalizing the woman in his presence.

And of course, I mustn’t forget a British woman in her 30′s having to leap out of her hotel window at 4 a.m. when a relative of the hotel owner knocked to offer a massage and was persistent about it.  This was in Agra, which ironically is 130 miles from Orccha — the assault location of the Swiss tourist.

Now it is tangible.  A strange, bitter taste on our tongues.  This is really happening and in frightening escalation, not just to Indian women, but to US.

‘US’ is a friend I met in Hong Kong over a year ago who is in Rajasthan right now. In Hong Kong, Connie Hum told me over dim sum about ‘active hands’ on a nightbus during her first trip to India.

Her current jaunt is rife with far worse.  Anonymous and faceless hands grabbing her body parts, suggestive stares and bold caterwauling.  Not honest, down home conversation.  But aggression.  Almost hate.  It’s very disturbing to see her endure this.  I think her article shows frustration, but also her love of the culture.

The wildfire reaches a climax.  There doesn’t seem to be enough water, no matter how much is dropped by the airtankers.  The intensity increases, columns of smoke and flame plume towards the sky.  What we have now folks, is what they call a firestorm.

Just when I think it can’t worsen, that a unicorn might gallop up, followed by a glorious rainbow, it does.

In the Guardian interview, Journalist Gethin Chamberlain draws some shocking quotes from the six men he interviews, which shapes their attitudes on rape and who’s at fault.

“Rape is a big, big problem. It starts with the woman. They drive the man fucking crazy.” Papi Gonzales.

One interviewee explains cultural clashes:

“Our culture is different,” said Abhijit Harmalkar. “Girls are not allowed outside after six [pm] because anything can happen – rape, robbery, kidnaps. It is the mentality of some people. They are putting on short and sexy dresses, that’s why. Then men cannot control themselves.”

What’s confusing is the six men believe that women in India are more equal now.

“Before, for many years, girls were neglected, boys got opportunities. Girls did not get opportunities, but now it is equal. It is a new generation, no difference between girls and boys,” said Shretha.

They don’t know what the solution to rape is, but one suggestion is that a girl’s movements at night should be stricter, because there seems to be a glaring difference between being a ‘day’ girl and a ‘night’ girl.

A ‘night’ girl is either close to a prostitute, antsy with provocations or a ripe target.

The interview setting is revealing in itself.  Baga, Goa is the sexy capital for pale-skinned foreigners to splash in the Arabian Sea, baring skin by the inches.  Bikinis are a regular sight.

Baga is also the spot where 15 year-old Scarlett Keeling’s body washed up on shore.  She was raped and murdered and a court case with the two accused has dragged on for five years.  Many feel the case will never be resolved.  Chamberlain’s theory is that people judge Keeling’s willfulness to drink in bars as a beacon of trouble. You asked for it.

I’m not writing this to scare you.  But it is scary.  The tips of my fingers sting from writing these words, for I’m scared too.

When I’m scared, I try to seek stable ground.  How to do that in this situation is tough.

I lived in India for five months.  I visited Rajasthan as well.

In her brave words, Connie wrote: “The sorry excuse that sexual repression is just a coverup for sexual AGGRESSION and I’m sick of the lot who are sexist, ignorant, and sexual predators.”

She’s right.  So right.  The excuse is sexual repression.  The sickening reality is sexual repression. There are backward attitudes on sexual mores for men and women.

Virginity is revered for both sexes.  If a man visits prostitutes, he is still marriageable   If it’s discovered a woman is not a virgin, she would be untouchable.

Men and women are virgins to an old age compared to North American cultural norms.  Sometimes as late as 27 years old.

In Kashmir, for example, if a boy and girl were seen together, and they were not related, people would gossip in the most nasty way imaginable.

I was lucky during my time in India.  I experienced living with an Indian family for a few months and then ventured off on the backpacker routes. I saw the duality.

During my time with the family, I noticed a protective atmosphere among the women.  A beautiful community among them.

When I left to pursue solo travel, what I witnessed was a world filled with men.  And a sexual tension so thick, it choked me at times.

Men and women don’t casually socialize with each other.  Are not at ease around one another.  At times it seemed they lived in separate dimensions. It’s that sense of viewing women as otherworldly, to objectification, and eventually as detached ‘things’ to bend at will.

That’s when everything breaks down.

I don’t profess to have all the answers.  This is what I saw.  How I felt.

Excuses.  Perhaps I give more.  Connie is just.  Something hopefully will change.  Has to.

At least they started with law.  A lower parliament court passed new laws on punishment for rape, including stalking and intimidation.  Longer jail terms have been implemented for all cases and the death penalty for a repeated offence of rape.  It’s not perfect, but it’s a start.

At least the media is focusing on the issue with full force, with fair and well-written stories to keep the spotlight on what’s important.

At least the Indian people rose up, with clenched fists and raised voices.  To demand that violence against women end.

At least women like Connie Hum keep traveling, despite those heart sinking setbacks.  That her honesty can educate others.  To love India, but hate the mindset.  The misogyny.

I hope, what I truly wish, is that we can change those minds.  To realize women are your sisters, mothers, friends and lovers.

Within all this, India is fantastical   She has a mystique that digs her hooks into you and never lets you go.  I even think of her to this day, and I haven’t been there since 2010.  She weaves a spell of landscapes, legends, myth and modernity.  A developing nation that’s trying to catch up with the sophistication of its ambitions.

Don’t let rape stain Mother India for you.  I won’t let it for me.

Resources:

1. A BBC article explaining the newly passed Indian rape laws.
2. The UN Sexual Violence Against Children and Rape Statistics.  The U.S. have an alarming 84.767 as of 2010, but India had only 22,172.  Yet hundreds of rape cases are dismissed by corrupt police or go unreported in India.
3.  New York Times piece from author Sonia Faleiro on how the New Delhi case caused a spark.
4. Terrific documentary by Al Jazeera on the challenges Indian women are facing in a changing society.
5.  Ms. Magazine op-ed on what it means to be female in India.