May 26 – July 2, 2011 Gallery 1: KENNETH TIN-KIN HUNG The Travelogue of Dr. Brain Damages ARTIST STATEMENT: In response to increasingly pervasive and draconian online censorship in China, “The Travelogue of Dr. Brain Damages” examines the role of Kuso culture (惡搞文化/ détournement) and its impact on Chinese internet. The Chinese title 腦殘遊記 is a homophonic wordplay to 老殘遊記 (The Travels of Lao Can), a late Qing dynasty novel that fiercely attacks the injustices, corruptions and exposed the hypocrisy of government officials at the time. In an era that internet as a tool for both freedom and suppression, the project questions whether internet in China is an effective tool for social changes by adapting and remixing Chinese netizens meme languages with Western icons. BACKGROUND: According to The China Internet Network Information Center (CNNIC), as of December 2010, China has the highest numbers of internet users in the world totaling 457 millions, which account as only 34.3% of the country’s population. Since 2002, online independent media and tabloids have played an important role in political discourse within Chinese society. Many Chinese intellectuals have used the Internet to discuss the possible evolution of Chinese politics. With the soaring growth of internet users in recent years, Internet becomes the major platform for Chinese citizens in exposing corrupt officials scandals (most famously “我爸是李刚!” ((My Dad Is Li Gang!)) incident), discussing current events and commenting on government policies. In response to the rise of internet freedom, the Chinese government escalates its effort to neutralize critical online opinion. China’s Internet censorship is regarded by many as the most pervasive and sophisticated in the world. According to a Harvard study, at least 18,000 websites are blocked from within the country. The first major online censorship measurement is the “金盾工程” (Golden Shield Project) which started in 1998 and began operations in November 2003. Known in the Western world as “The Great Firewall of China”, the project aims to block content by preventing IP addresses from being routed through and consists of standard firewalls and proxy servers at the Internet gateways. In 2005, see the beginning of “五毛党” (50 Cents Party). Officially designated as Internet commentators, “50 Cents Party” are people hired by the Chinese Government to post comments favorable towards the government policies to skew the public opinion on various Internet message boards. They operate on domestic websites, bulletin board systems, and chatrooms. Their role is to steer the discussion away from anti-party articulations, politically sensitive or “unacceptable” content and advance the party line of the Communist Party. In 2009 comes another draconian censorship project- the “绿坝·花季护航” (Green Dam Youth Escort). Green Dam Youth Escort is content-control software for Microsoft Windows operating systems developed in the People’s Republic of China (PRC). Originally under a directive from the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT) to take effect on 1 July 2009, it was to be mandatory to have either the software pre-installed, or have the setup files on an accompanying compact disc, for all new personal computers sold in mainland China, including those imported from abroad. However, because the proposed policy proved deeply unpopular, mandatory pre-installation has been delayed to an undetermined date. In response, Internet citizens have created a manga-style Moe anthropomorphism named “绿坝” (Green Dam Girl) to parody the pervasive policy. Also in early 2009, another project namely “整治互联网低俗之风专项行动” (Correct Internet Vulgar Content Special Operation) is implemented by the authorities. As the title of the campaign suggested, more than 1911 websites that included vulgar languages and pornographic materials are ordered to shut down and performed self-censorship. Among the websites being accused of “vulgar” are the four biggest Chinese websites- Sina, Sohu, Baidu and Tencent, as well as foreign websites including Google and MSN. Chinese profane languages including “操你媽” (Fuck your Mother) are ordered to be removed entirely from 1 the Chinese internet. In response to the campaign, Chinese netizens invented “百度十大神兽” (The Baidu 10 Mythical Creatures). The internet meme initially began as a series of vandalized contributions to Baidu Baike (Chinese version of Wikipedia), through the creation of humorous articles describing a series of fictional creatures, with each animal with names vaguely referring to Chinese profanities (utilizing homophones and characters using different tones). The most notable one is 草泥马 “Grass Mud Horse” which share a similar pronunciation of 操你媽 (Fuck Your Mother). Almost overnight, Chinese internet users started substituting the profanities with the mythical creatures and a widespread internet meme phenomenon was born. Grass Mud Horse has since become the icon of citizens’ resistance to censorship. In February 2011, inspired by and named after the Jasmine Revolution in Tunisia, anonymous call for a 中國茉莉花革命 (Chinese Jasmine Revolution) in China’s major cities was made online, first on the Boxun.com website, run by overseas dissidents, and then on Twitter. The initial call for protest began on 19 February 2011 when 12 to 13 cities were suggested. The Boxun.com appeal called for protests to take place each weekend, arguing that “sustained action will show the Chinese government that its people expect accountability and transparency that doesn’t exist under the current one-party system.” In response to the Jasmine Revolution, world’s largest mobile phone operator China Mobile and state-owned China Unicom blocked the word “jasmine”. Searches for “jasmine” were also blocked on China’s largest microblog, Sina Weibo, and status updates with the word on Chinese social networking site Renren were met with an error message and a warning to refrain from postings with “political, sensitive … or other inappropriate content.” Since the word “Jasmine” was forbidden in the Chinese blogosphere, millions of netizens used the term “兩會” (Two Conferences) instead, a widely used expression in the official news originally pointing to the two conferences “Fourth Session of the Eleventh National People’s Congress” and “Fourth Session of the Eleventh CPPCC” happening in March in Beijing. Since late February, about 35 human rights activists and lawyers were arrested or detained by authorities, five people were charged with inciting subversion of state power, and up to 200 people are subject to reinforced supervision or house arrest. Among them are leading Sichuan human rights activist 陈卫 (Chen Wei), Tiananmen Square protest student leader 丁矛 (Ding Mao), well-known blogger 冉云飞 (Ran Yunfei), and 滕彪 (Teng Biao) of 公盟 (Open Constitution Initiative OCI). The highest-profile arrest is Ai WeiWei, who was taken into police custody on 3 April in Beijing. In April, 2011, hackers attack online petition platform Change.org in the wake of a campaign calling for the release of Chinese artist and activist Ai WeiWei. The petition has attracted more than 130,000 signatures, including many from leading museums such as the Guggenheim, MoMA and Tate Modern. POPULAR CHINESE INTERNET TERMS: To understand the symbols used in this project please visit ChinaDigitalTime.org and ChinaSmack.com for a detailed list of common Chinese-language internet terms, expressions, acronyms, or slang. INSTALLATION: On the wall of the installation behind the framed works, the message “不翻长城非好汉” was written with bright red paint. The original Chinese quote is ” 不到” by Mao ZeDong meaning “If you fail to reach the Great Wall, you are not a true Real Man.” One character was changed and now it means “If you fail to leap over the Great FireWall of China, you are not a true Real Man.” The calligraphy style is a reminiscence of the “拆” (Demolish) and the utilitarian look of hand drawn “no parking” or “don’t spit” warning signs in the old neighborhoods within major Chinese cities. The installation consists of 10 framed digital prints, a 6 minutes long HD video and a ping-pong table sculpture. WORKS: The works in the series is divided into two different categories and serves different purposes: • Documentary and Social Commentary- The works in this category are meant to document and comment on the historical progress of Chinese internet censorship and its resistance. • Testing the Water- The works in this category are meant to be distributed virally in Chinese’s internet realm, thus includes more Tongue-in-cheek Chinese wordplays that aims to generate responses. 2 Chinese Contradicted Patriot Wine 2011 digital print on canvas 36 x 48 X 4 inches edition of 5 + AP A pun on the Chinese iconic national liquor 茅台酒 (MouTai), the revised content of the 矛盾酒 (MouDun) consisted of the following messages in Chinese (follow by English translation): • 纯茉莉花酿制- Fermented and brewed by Pure Jasmine • 爱国度: 120% Vol- Level of Patriotism: 120% Vol • 净含量: 5000 Yrs- Content: 5000 Years • Ma de in China- “Ma de” is the Romanization for 妈的 which literally means “mother’s” and is short for “f**k your mother.” The term is roughly equivalent to “damn,” or “f**k” in English. • 神州天朝马勒戈壁市某山寨酒厂- 神州 (China), (The Celestial Empire- an ancient name for China. Recently, netizens have used the term sarcastically to refer to China under the current government. Oftentimes the term is used to suggest that China’s leaders are self- important and have a China-centric view of the world.), (The Mahler Gobi is the fictional home of the Grass-Mud Horse. In Chinese, “mǎ lè gē bì” sounds the same as “your mother’s f**ing cunt” (妈了个屄), 某山寨 (some imitation/ knock-off distillery) • 敏感瓷加倍过滤- 敏感瓷 (sensitive porcelain) sounds the same in Chinese as “sensitive words” (敏词). “Sensitive words” in China are names of politicians, religious movements (like Falun Gong), events like (The thirty-fifth of May), and subversive online terms (like Grass- Mud Horse). 加倍 means extreme distilled (filtered). The phrase means the sensitive words are being extremely filtered.