I have no doubt that heads are going to roll after this fiasco. The Mandarin Oriental Hotel was designed by Rem Koolhaas in conjunction with the even more imposing CCTV Tower. Constructed during the 2008 Summer Olympic development boom, the complex stood for a sleek, modern image of Beijing that the Chinese Communist Party continues to paint for the rest of the world. Now the building will always be remembered for the massive fireball it turned into on Lunar New Years and the resulting charred shell standing in the middle of the Central Business District. In an unlikely turn of events, an old world celebration took down China’s new world order.

For now the Chinese media have been rather tightlipped about the situation. China’s Net Nanny was also on the prowl last night as videos posted to YouTube were temporarily blocked as well as links to articles in foreign media sources. Even local workers setting up food carts for morning commuters at 4AM across the street from the tower had no idea that a fire ravaged the building just hours before. In all, there was a general sense of shock mixed with grim acknowledgment of the highly symbolic nature of the building’s destruction.

Fortunately the Mandarin Oriental Hotel was unoccupied before the blaze, the only reported death being that of a firefighter. For now, the spinners in the Propaganda Bureau are going to have an unenviable task of trying to save as much face as possible both domestically and abroad. This is also a sad moment for me personally, as I remain a huge fan of the CCTV complex design. Now the Mandarin Oriental Hotel will be condemned and suffer the fate of the hutongs and block housing that came before.

Props to Omar for giving me the post title.

Cao Fei, a 29-year-old Guangzhou native, uses the much-heralded Second Life online world as an artistic medium. The user-generated virtual environment first inspired her video project i.Mirror, a Second Life documentary using screen captures of her digital avatar dubbed China Tracy. Cao Fei begins the sequence of videos with a quote taken from William J. Mitchell’s Me++: The Cyborg Self and the Networked City, “I construct, and I am constructed, in a mutually recursive process that continually engages my fluid, permeable boundaries and my endlessly ramifying networks. I am a spatially extended cyborg.” What follows is a surreal montage of dreamlike landscapes interlaced with fleeting relationships. Cao Fei calls it an illusion, but one dominated by youth, beauty, and money – something too well connected to reality and therein capable of transcending the many boundaries commonly placed between the digital and physical self.

Her newest project, RMB City, is also making waves in the international art circuit with its recent appearance at Art Basel in Miami and the Istanbul Biennial. Designed completely within Second Life, RMB City is a recreation of China’s social landscape in all its paradoxical glory. Giant panda’s hang from cranes while the Bird’s Nest stadium lies partially submerged off the island’s waterfront. Even Tiananmen Square has a swimming pool. Her manifesto explains, “RMB City… doesn’t restore the full present, nor does it recall our reminiscence of the past. It’s a mirror that partially reflects; we see where we were coming from, discover some of the ‘connections’ that fill the pale zone between the real and the virtual, the clues of which get disturbed, enriched, and polished.” Still, plots on the island are up for sale at prices only someone with Cao Fei’s clout could demand for cyber art. A European collector already secured his nook of virtual real estate for 100,000 Euros. Apparently participation comes at a price.

Second Life has drawn its fair share of praise as it blends formerly disparate modes of collective experience, but Cao Fei now promises to take it to a new level. RMB City, as a work of art, cannot be enjoyed outside a digital network. Its environment demands continual submersion into virtual spaces – liminal worlds fueled by self-expression and unfettered by social mores. For some it might continually erode their reality, but others find solace in the online worlds and continue to explore different aspects of the self as Cao Fei lives through China Tracy.

Whether you like it or not, comic books and graphic novels are turning into one of the most widespread and influential forms of popular culture. Although China is far from eclipsing Japan’s manga scene, younger generations in Beijing with unprecedented access to foreign media are getting hooked. Cult Youth stands at the forefront of this movement. Guoqi (郭麒), one of twenty plus Cult Youth affiliated artists, noted, “that caricatures from any historical period are very valuable, but this generation in China saw many comics from different countries while growing up and now understand their important nature. People no longer believe comics are for children only.” Everyday occurrences enter the illustrator’s palette and take on new forms that fascinate both the young and old.

The most appealing nature of Cult Youth’s newest anthology is the eclectic array of themes presented in each graphic short. In many ways, it mirrors the kaleidoscope of often-conflicting interests, desires, and traditions that exist in modern China. Ca (擦), one of the founding members of Cult Youth, expounded, “We don’t say exactly who we are. We don’t pretend to represent any particular thing about China. Rather, our work grows out of our own personal interests. We have a wide range of opinions and aren’t primarily interested in any sort of pure documentary effort or work that invokes a feeling of social responsibility.” The unparalleled multiplicity of people in China defies any generalization and Cult Youth mirrors that chaos with their unstinting and often trenchant conceptual takes on life in the Middle Kingdom.

Still, many of the Cult Youth artists claim to grapple with a materialistic void growing within society and therefore feel their influence is gaining momentum. “China’s masses deal with an impoverished mainstream culture. Many are hungry for more, and it seems Cult Youth’s free and willful comics is what they need,” asserted Songqi (宋麒), Guoqi’s (郭麒) twin brother. With more dedicated readers, the anthology certainly resonates in a particular manner – the witty and insightful strips draw you in with their arresting and sometimes grotesque illustrations.

Cult Youth personifies the increasing number of Chinese becoming aware of the impact of international media on their country and the disjunction it represents from the experience of previous generations. “Older people had a world of their own,” Ca (擦) continued, “Such things cannot be passed on. The new youth access everything.” Many of the artists expressed the need to lead people to a new understanding of the information explosion occurring around them and therein present new outlets for individual expression while underhandedly capturing the pitfalls of modern China. According to Heilichi (黑荔枝), “Independent thinking leads to happiness.” There is a growing sense among the Cult Youth illustrators that even if they get labeled as outsiders, their work will continue to speak for itself.

In the end, Cult Youth still agrees on one thing: they want people to laugh and appreciate the absurdities of life. There is a mischievous air about the group as they reinterpret the already convoluted world surrounding them in Beijing. Not many of them know what the future holds, but they love their work and produced a unique anthology of graphic shorts that present a small but captivating window into contemporary China.

It still came as a bit of a surprise when Dinah Gardner, the longtime Gay & Lesbian columnist for TimeOut Beijing, told me we were going to the White Cloud Temple and the Source of Law Temple to ask monks about their respective views on homosexuality. Even though I consider myself well versed within the Daoist and Buddhist canon, it never really crossed my mind to ask such a question before and I was interested in how the monks would frame their responses. As the photographer, I could also sit back and watch the fireworks fly.

Lou Jiayong, a Daoist monk at the White Cloud Temple, was the first to get entrapped by Dinah. She started the interview with some elementary questions concerning Daoism and then popped him the big one: “In the West, Islam and Christianity often persecute homosexuals. How does Daoism feel about homosexuality amongst practitioners?” Lou handled the question surprisingly well. According to Daoist principle, homosexuality represents a metaphysical problem. The union of two Yang forces (male on male) creates disharmony within the Dao and must eventually be resolved. “If there is only Yin or Yang it is imbalance or disharmony,” stressed Lou. Homosexual relationships do not perpetuate natural life. At some point, Yin must mix with Yang to produce more babies. Lou did emphasize that Daoism would never discriminate against homosexuals but remained adamant that Daoist ideology could never condone what he considered lewd sexual acts and anomalies in the natural course of existence.

Zhi Yong, a Buddhist monk at the Source of Law Temple, remained unperturbed throughout his interview. Buddhist practitioners of any orientation are encouraged to stem their sexual desires in order to achieve inner peace. At the heart, there is no absolute right or wrong with regards to homosexuality. Zhi continued, “[Homosexuality] is abnormal to me, but of course from the point of view of a gay person, it is quite normal… In Buddhism everything has two sides. How can you say, ‘this is right,’ or, ‘this is wrong?’ There is no right or wrong in this world. For some people they are right, for others they are wrong.” While I might not support such moral ambiguity in other situations, being gay and Buddhist doesn’t represent a problem for lay people. Still, if you want to join a monastery you must leave any prurient thoughts at the door.

Unlike other purported art centers, cofounders and noted photographers RongRong and inri dedicated over 130 square meters of workspace for three darkrooms and a digital lab. True to their mission to foster contemporary photography in China, the workspace is open to the public at prices undercutting commercial labs. Photo enthusiasts can make gallery quality prints with enlargers for 120 film, an Imacon 949 scanner, and an HP 44-inch inkjet printer. It is a rare opportunity to get hands-on experience with such equipment, let alone in such a supportive and stimulating atmosphere.

If inspiration is still lacking, Three Shadows also maintains the Library of Contemporary Photography. “It is a resouce for young photographers and artists,”explained Stephanie Tung, International Affairs Officer at Three Shadows, “something RongRong lacked when he first started.” The fine assortment of books encompasses a broad swath of both Chinese and international art publications. It is well worth spending an extra hour saturating one’s brain in perennial favorites and more eclectic selections from the collection. With support and donations, the library will continue to become an important aid to any local photographer – access to so many art photography books in one place is a unique find anywhere in the world.

Hopefully more galleries and art centers will pick up on Three Shadows undertaking to not only provide an excellent venue to view art, but also foster and motivate a new generation of artists. Art director Zhang Li, who just won the Grand Prize at the 2007 Nantes Film Festival for his film Crime and Punishment, promises to explore fringe developments in contemporary art while surveying important works from the past. The current exhibition, Convection, takes this task at hand with selections from Man Ray, Robert Frank, Zhang Haier, Liu Zheng, and many others. Stay posted to threeshadows.cn for upcoming speakers and exhibitions.

While many pundits attribute this tragedy to substandard store design or base materialism, the heart of it lies in desperation. Over the past year the Chinese state singled out Chongqinq to be a frontrunner in a national campaign to urbanize the interior. Even though government subsidies abound, they do not trickle down to the lower rungs of the social ladder. Chongqinq remains a precarious place to make ends meet. Getting ahold of discounted cooking oil, a bare essential in any Chinese home, thus represents a wish to avoid the privations of winter and not low-minded greed.

In any case, retail outlets continue to attract shoppers in large droves. The economies of scale are too big to resist and dominate the increasingly consumer-oriented mentality of Chinese urbanites. Multinational corporations fall over themselves catering to this acquisitive upsurge. Ikea just built its largest store in the world in Beijing. The garagantun space boasts over four floors of housewares and furniture – everything a new homemaker could possibly imagine. Unfortunately I fall into this category and lined up with the rest to indulge the guilty pleasures of my nesting impulse.

The industrious purveyors of this cabbage deluge never rest during the peak purchasing period. After sunset they spread blankets on the ground and watch over their hulking mounds of produce through the night. My neighborhood cabbage dealer usually lives just north of Beijing where he runs a large market garden. A keen salesman, he is quick to offer a cigarette and always sports a billowing navy-blue suit. Apparently he doesn’t mind the three weeks spent on the street even though others complain about the “bitterness” of the whole entrerprise. “This is when I make all my money,” he explained, “it’s fun on the street and my girlfriend loves me when I get home.” Fortunately nearby residents can’t get enough cabbage – a perennial treat for any old hand in Beijing.

Although this does not mark the eminent demise of the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) iron grip on the Chinese state, the CCP is scrambling to revamp their ministry of disinformation (aka The Central Propaganda Department – 中共中央宣传部) and methods of pacifying perturbed social groups. Puppet strings amongst the masses are growing taut and sometimes snapping as the Chinese state loses ground in an increasingly influential online world. Bloggers and journalists now regularly flout bans on reporting events blacklisted by the Chinese state. As the masses continue to grow wary of the Chinese state’s official mouthpieces, they actively seek out alternative media outlets both at home and abroad. Even though only a tenth of China’s massive 1.3 billion population consistently access the Internet, these numbers are rising just as fast as China’s breakneck GDP growth.

The greatest hope for this information revolution subsists in the Chinese state’s reliance on new communication technologies to drive economic expansion. They cannot simply unplug the masses. While Burma cut the Internet with ease during recent pro-democracy protests, the Chinese State would bring untold ruin to markets that increasingly depend on the Internet to drive business and communication. It would also represent a massive step backward in desperate attempts to present a polished facade for the world during the Olympics. In any case, the future political battlefield will certainly take place online where everyone can have an equal stake much to the CCP’s dismay.

Link: The Great Firewall: China’s Misguided — and Futile — Attempt to Control What Happens Online