Crossroads in Cultural Studies Conference 14-17th December 2016 Program Index

1983. Drawn from a project seeking to develop the first cultural history of Eurovision fans in Australia, this
paper explores how the Australian fanbase for Eurovision has emerged from two occasionally intersecting
sites: the second and third generations of post-WWII European migrants, and the LGBTI and ally
communities. Australian fans are drawn to Eurovision’s ethos of inclusiveness and acceptance, which
appeals to both ethnic and gender minorities, and facilitates the development of local and transnational
communities and identities.
2J
Art and Chinese political transformation (Chair, Adiel Portugali)
Guoqian Li
Andy Warhol and Communism through the lens of his Pop Mao images
After Nixon’s visit of China in 1972, using his signature pop aesthetic, Warhol created a series of paintings of
the Chinese Communist leader Mao Zedong, comprising of painting, drawing, prints and even wallpapers.
The original image he used was transcribed from the “Little Red Book”, the quotations of Chairman Mao. It
was published during Chinese Cultural Revolution era (1966-1976) and was widely circulated in western
regions during the Cold War. Among his many artworks, Chairman Mao is the rare foreign motif he chose to
depict and he painted it into numerous versions. Living through the Civil Rights Movement and Cold War,
Warhol witnessed how American hegemony was challenged both domestically and internationally. Chinese
Communism at that time was the prioritized “enemy” America targeted on since within America, Maoist
ideology of nationalism and racism nurtured American Black Panther Resistance Movement while outside of
America, China and Soviet Union were the enemies in the battlefield of Vietnam War. In this paper, I will
examine Warhol through an international lens, to uncover his thinking about communism in relation to his
appropriation of the Mao image. I will use of Foucauldian discourse to couch my understanding of Warhol as
a subject of his times. My arguments of Warhol’s connection with communism would cover three main
aspects. Firstly, I will trace the ways in which Warhol’s early living surroundings influenced his view of
communism. Warhol’s poor neighborhood had strong ties to Communist-lead activism and union organizing.
Additionally, most of the art professors whom Warhol worked with at Carnegie Tech, including R. L. Lepper
and Samuel Rosenberg were left-wingers of the social realisms school. Secondly, Warhol’s imagination of
China or his depiction of Mao images was nevertheless infused with his reflection of American experience. In
other words, his vision of communism demonstrated through his depiction of Mao images can be
deciphered through his view of the contemporary America and its capitalism. Besides that I will also examine
the representation of Chinese communism in American visual culture of the 60s and 70s and explain in what
ways it shapes Warhol’s response to communism especially in considering his homosexual identity.
Qian Gong
and Opening
The Red Sister-in-Law Remakes: Redefining the “Fish-and-Water” Relationship for the Era of Reform
Ode to Yimeng (Yingmeng Song), a major ballet production created in May 1974, was based on the novel of
Red Sister-in-Law (Hongsao). It is one of Red Classics that deals with revolutionary “base area,” and in
essence, about how Communist Party won the support of the subaltern, the backbone of the Chinese society
at a tipping point of modern Chinese history, when CCP triumphed over the Nationalist army. The story of
heroine, Sister-in-Law Ying, who saved a seriously wounded Communist soldier with her breast milk and
nurtured him back to life, was once metaphoric and metonymic of the symbiotic relationships between army
and the people. This paper argues that the post-Mao remake in the format of television drama has
significantly re-defined the essence of the “fish-and-water” relationship in the spirit of traditional Chinese
values and, in particular, Confucian values.
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