Leasehold installation key to land policy history

By Wu Ziru

Entitled Leasehold, Chinese artist Mao Tongqiang's solo exhibition is being held at the Wall Art Museum, showing his latest work – a large-scale installation composed of more than 1,400 leasehold agreements
that the artist gathered from across the country.

While some of the leaseholds date back to the Qing Dynasty (1644-1911), most are from the 1990s, reflecting the dramatic transfer of land policy in China over the past century.

"A country with a history of several thousands of years of agricultural civilization, it is unavoidable to consider its land policies while observing its society, "the artist explained. "Leaseholds are critical when talking about the land policies here."

Among the leaseholds of 1942, some are from the revolutionary bases, some are from the Manchukuo puppet regime (1932-45) and others are from he Kuomintang-ruled areas, all with dramatically different designs.

Aside from touching on the complicated story of Chinese land policies over the last century, Mao said that through this work he also wants to encourage people to consider the living conditions of people in China's rural areas today.

"During the process of modernization and urbanization, the peasants are losing their land and they flood to coastal areas to be migrant workers, but what if one day they are too old to do physical work?"Mao sked.

Li Xianting, considered the godfather of Chinese avant garde art, spoke highly of Mao's installation. "As a symbol of land ownership, these leaseholds reflect Chinese peasants' fate in the last century."

"It might be one of the most important works in the Chinese contemporary art world in the past 10 or even 30 years,"Li said.

Born in 1960, Mao is among the most representative Chinese contemporary artists who showed great interest in Chinese modern history in the 20th century.

To complete this piece of work, the artist traveled for over three years collecting the leaseholds.

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