• Cartoon and Animation Studies
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• s.45
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• pp.321-343
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• 2016

The purpose of this thesis is to look through the political and social background of China preparing for a new era after getting out of the Communist Party of Mao Zedong, rapid inflow of the Western modernism and the avant-garde art arising in China with the focus of art works of Xu Bing, which contributed to the expansion of printmaking of China. Particularly, 85 New Wave Movement arose by young artists since 1985 and the China/Avant-Garde Exhibition held in Beijing in 1989 are the two important issues which reflect a new change from the traditional Chinese art. The artists of 85 New Wave Movement, who pursued a historical revolution and novelty, worked very actively by leading private exhibitions. Since the Cultural Revolution, the government owned the National Museum of Fine Art Beijing had exhibitions on a large scale displaying various visual arts such as performing art, installation, painting, sculpture but the Chinese government interrupted exhibitions two time due to bold performing art and unconcealed installation. Some artists were even taken to the police when performing art. Under these circumstances, Xu Bing, who majored printmaking, produced one of his major works, Books from the sky(1988), while he was working on various experiments focusing on the production process of printmaking and its repetitiveness. Xu Bing devised letters, carved them in trees and finally created approximately 2000 characters. Going further he displayed it as installation work, which means the developed characters go beyond a printed form, for audiences. This made him earn favorable reviews since it was a form of western art coupled with Chinese contents 'Chinese character'. After he received unfavorable reviews, however, he went to America leaving his last work in China, Ghost Pounding the Wall, in 1990, which was not able to exhibited. In those days, China society was going through a chaotic era thanks to the extinction of the Cultural Revolution and Deng Xiaoping's(1904-1997) reformation after the debacle of Tiananmen Massacre. This study looks into Xu Bing's artworks from his initial print works until he went to the US in 1991 and examines how he performed experiments utilizing reproductivity and plurality of prints tinged with Chinese traditional elements, and ultimately became one of the avant-garde artists representing the period.