What’s eating Wu Junyong? Back in 2005, the painter, cartoonist and animator struck Chinese mainstream consciousness like a brick to the face. His short animation ‘Wait Us Rich’ rode shotgun on a local internet craze for underground Flash cartoons. It was a darkly satirical, hyper-sexed vision of China that epitomised a growing discontent with the PRC’s nouveau riche. Six years later, his new exhibition at F2 Gallery has Wu don his painter’s hat, but can he still have the same impact?
We meet in the artist’s studio amid a haze of works still to be finished. Giant canvases spill chaotically over the walls, while the 32-year-old artist sits politely in a homemade T-shirt and shorts amid the clutter of creativity. He exudes an almost serene calm, in stark contrast to the canvases and animations where his wrath spills over the mediums as easily as a fat cat swills a goblet of wine. But one shouldn’t be surprised, Wu’s work is all about discrepancy: the gap between what you’re told – or in my case, assume – and what is. ‘Art and society should have a direct relationship with each other,’ he gesticulates.
‘Art directly affects society and society on the way back affects art. In the current social situation, we live in a very oblique era. I want to use my works to reflect the reality of our setting.’
It’s the calling card of the satirist – a difficult profession in this part of the world. It is also the cry of the ‘New Wooden Carving Movement’ (新兴木刻运动) started by the Chinese writer and social critic of the 1930s, Lu Xun. But that’s merely giving it a name. There is something more timeless about Wu’s ire. ‘With the large paintings, sometimes there is a certain reality,’ he explains over tea, ‘but I’m just asking fundamental questions, like the old European paintings that depict a battlefield or historical events.’
Wu grew up in a small town in Fujian Province dominated by folk arts – the kind of place where the notion of a professional artist is unheard of, and the sole paintings on display were Soviet and Chinese propagandist pieces. Only when he went on to study new media at art college, grounded in library books and the tastes of his peers, did he discover influences such as Bosch, Rembrandt and Durer.
His style lies somewhere in between the three, combined with an old-school morality that masks social criticisms in fables and wordplay. He sharpens his satirical barbs with a distinctly Chinese storyteller’s brush, such as in one painting from his new show entitled ‘Journey to the Other Side of the Wall’. Here, he takes an image from the tale of Journey to the West, likening the story to the act of surmounting China’s internet firewall via the common term fan qiang (翻墙), meaning ‘to go through the wall’. ‘In China, surfing the internet is just the modern version of Journey to the West,’ explains Wu. ‘We also need to “go through the wall” to see the real Western world.’
However, perhaps because of its folk wisdoms, Wu’s work does run the danger of being lost to foreign eyes. One recurring example is that of the ‘pointy hat men’. In the painting ‘Crown’, a man takes off his hat to reveal only an empty skull; in others, behatted characters scatter the chaos like Hieronymus Bosch’s worst nightmare. The image comes from another direct translation of a common Chinese idiom: ‘to put on a tall hat’, which means to flatter. It’s like a code for the artist’s wrath, but badly requires context.
Perhaps tellingly, these mad hatters have become Wu’s favourite characters, as he explains: ‘I sometimes see human beings as being like animals, but when you wear a hat, which is a product of society, you start to take on a social role. You engage with society.’ It is almost as if the ‘hat men’ mark the boundary between the two, with Wu, the artist, policing the border like a sheriff, punishing flattery and injustice wherever it may rise.
As if to confirm that notion, he shows me an ongoing project entitled Chaos. It is a series of satirical cartoons he posts ‘almost every day’ on Weibo. They frequently feature the ‘hat men’, satirising news stories, celebrities and events. But what they serve to highlight is the fundamental divide in the artist: the new media microblogger jabbing back at society versus the animator/painter coaxing his slow truths in tales and idioms. But who will win?
Where Wu has most impact is surely on canvas and film. Here, his satirical wit and distinctly Chinese voice find time to ponder. By his own admittance, he is more thoughtful nowadays. In the six years since ‘Wait Us Rich’ broke, his animations have become more refined, his eye sharper and his painting style bolder. But, as we leave him in his studio, it is clear that Wu Junyong can still shock in whatever medium he chooses. People who tell the truth always can.