The Stars Art Group
   HOME

TheInfoList



OR:

The Stars Art Group or simply "The Stars" (Xīngxīng 星星) was a Chinese avant-garde group of non-professional artists in the late 1970s and early 1980s (the exact interval usually given as 1979 to 1983). It was founded by Ma Desheng and Huang Rui and included Wang Keping (王克平),
Qu Leilei Qu Leilei (曲磊磊, born 1951)Jung Chang, Yung Chang. (1996Preface to ''A Visual Diary'' reproduced at redfern-gallery.com. Retrieved 19 March 2008. is a contemporary Han Chinese, Chinese artist currently based in the UK. Qu grew up in China d ...
,
Ah Cheng Zhong Acheng (; born 1949), often known by his pseudonym Ah Cheng, is a Chinese author and screenwriter. In 1979, together with He Dong, Ma Desheng, Wang Keping, Huang Rui, Li Shuang, Qu Leilei and Ai Weiwei, Ah Cheng founded the Stars Group ( ...
,
Ai Weiwei Ai Weiwei (, ; born 28 August 1957) is a Chinese contemporary artist, documentarian, and activist. Ai grew up in the far northwest of China, where he lived under harsh conditions due to his father's exile. As an activist, he has been openly c ...
, and
Li Shuang (artist) Li Shuang (李爽, born 1957 in Beijing), is a contemporary Chinese artist. Li Shuang's works testify to her painful personal and artistic journey. She grew up in Beijing during the Cultural Revolution within a family of intellectuals. Her ea ...
as the only female member. A historically significant exhibition, now called the Star Art Exhibition, took place in late 1979 in Beihai Park,
Beijing } Beijing ( ; ; ), alternatively romanized as Peking ( ), is the capital of the People's Republic of China. It is the center of power and development of the country. Beijing is the world's most populous national capital city, with over 21 ...
, outside the China Art Gallery. After the exhibition was closed by officials, the group staged a protest for cultural openness. They succeeded in reopening the exhibition. The exhibition took place between 23 November and 2 December, in which around 200,000 people attended the event. The group organized another exhibition the next year. Around and after 1983, the group disbanded, partly due to their members going into exile under political pressure, especially the Anti-Spiritual Pollution Campaign of 1983. The Stars Art Group was a foundational movement of the contemporary Chinese avant-garde active in the late 1970s and early 1980s. Mostly self-trained, the Stars championed individualism and freedom of expression both in their work and public activities. Taking personal experience and social issues as their subject matter, they pointedly diverged from state-sanctioned
Socialist Realism Socialist realism is a style of idealized realistic art that was developed in the Soviet Union and was the official style in that country between 1932 and 1988, as well as in other socialist countries after World War II. Socialist realism is c ...
. The group's member artists also included affiliates Zhang Hongtu and Zhang Wei, Yan Li, Yang Yiping,
Qu Leilei Qu Leilei (曲磊磊, born 1951)Jung Chang, Yung Chang. (1996Preface to ''A Visual Diary'' reproduced at redfern-gallery.com. Retrieved 19 March 2008. is a contemporary Han Chinese, Chinese artist currently based in the UK. Qu grew up in China d ...
, Mao Lizi, Bo Yun, Zhong Ahcheng, Shao Fei, and Ma Desheng.


See also

*
Culture of the People's Republic of China The culture of the People's Republic of China is a rich and varied blend of traditional Chinese culture with communism, communist and other international modern and post-modern influences. During the Cultural Revolution, an enormous number of cu ...
*
Chinese intellectualism The current status of Chinese intellectuals reflects traditions established in the imperial period. For most of this period, government officials were selected from among the literati on the basis of the Confucian civil service examination system ...
* The Fifth Modernization *
Chinese democracy movement Democracy movements of China are a series of organized political movements, inside and outside of China, addressing a variety of grievances, including objections to socialist bureaucratism and objections to the continuation of the one-party ru ...
*
1989 Tiananmen Square protests The Tiananmen Square protests, known in Chinese as the June Fourth Incident (), were student-led demonstrations held in Tiananmen Square, Beijing during 1989. In what is known as the Tiananmen Square Massacre, or in Chinese the June Fourth ...


References

{{reflist Chinese contemporary art Chinese artist groups and collectives