#line 11

The focal work of ‘Mistah Kurtz - He Not Dead’ (this title is misquoted from Conrad’s novella, reversing the fortunes of ‘Mistah Kurtz’, who is pronounced dead by a servant in Part 3) is Banner’s six-minute film, in which Pellegrin’s monochrome images pulsate and flicker to a soundtrack of open outcry trading at the London Metal Exchange underscored by a perpetual drumbeat. Presented with this rhythmic momentum Banner’s ideological filter is swept to the fore; every aspect of London life is recorded as evidence of a political regime. Here, trading platforms become battlegrounds, offices become hubbubs of conspiracy, and workers are kept under constant surveillance.

  The images are both complicit and distanced; re-framing a landscape that is at once unknowable and completely known. Resurfacing outmoded clichés such as pinstripe suits and strip-club frequenters, they simultaneously subvert and reinforce the stereotypes associated with the ostentatious lifestyle of a City Banker.

  Banner employs museum techniques to display further images and objects, using vitrines and archival captions to elevate them into the historical realm. An aerial view of London is peppered with red markers, pinpointing the locations of numerous strip-clubs. These clubs can no longer obtain licences to operate within the city itself so instead exist immediately outside it; visible indication of the dependency between the two worlds. These items are presented as artefacts, but the subversion of archival techniques renders them empty, reducing them to novelty.

  Similarly, the pinstripe suit as the uniform of the financial marketplace is echoed throughout the exhibition: monolithic graphite drawings adorn the gallery walls - crotches and arses loom ominously at eye level. A set of false nails lies in a vitrine bearing the pinstripe insignia. The stripes become soporific and redundant in their repetition - stripes are, after all, mere pattern.

  Banner’s analysis of the financial market highlights its mysterious nature; it can be intelligibly reduced to its components, but it is fundamentally intangible. How many men will have seen the money with which they are trading? Stocks and shares are not physical objects. Thus, she reveals the arbitrary correlation between elusive financial products and the notoriously luxurious lifestyle they generate.

  Although Pellegrin is an expert in documenting war, the success of this project stems from Banner’s decision to frame London as a landscape embedded with conflict. To approach The City as a theatre of war is to suppose a fundamental corruption; to reveal a seediness and ruthlessness that is already legendary. The City is the archetype of social elitism. Looking at it through this lens renders it mythical; it becomes fiction in its absurdity, and, paradoxically, its apparent realness.

  Banner creates a parallel between Conrad’s narrative and her investigations into London’s contemporary financial affairs. That is not to say that she directly equates the two, but rather indicates that they are irredeemably linked; that no understanding of Colonialism can exist without an understanding of the City of London - the global headquarters of international finance. Additionally, through her use of documentary photography, Banner implicates the necessity of witnessing horror in order to accept it. Only faced with these images can we understand the myth of The City. Banner’s misappropriation of Conrad’s writing reverberates with unsettling accuracy: Mistah Kurtz - he not dead.

I now live in Beijing, and recently, following a series of unexpected events, I found myself in a taxi and on my way to Ai Weiwei’s studio. A friend with impressive contacts was having lunch with Lu Qing, and was able to extend the invitation. You may not recognise her name, but you will perhaps know who Lu Qing is: in the media she is usually referred to as simply as Ai Weiwei’s ‘long-standing wife’ - or some similar phrase - despite the fact that she is also a successful and internationally recognised artist in her own right. I didn’t know much about her work, and I wanted to use the opportunity to learn more about her artist practise that seems to receive so little coverage.

Over lunch Lu Qing spoke a little about her artistic background. She trained at the Central Academy of Fine Arts, and specialised in banhua, or printmaking. I ask her if she still does any such work, but she says she hasn’t for many years; after finishing at the academy she painted primarily abstract works, using oil on canvas. Since 2000, however, she started working in a new way, using acrylic. She goes upstairs and brings down a small, slightly dusty exhibition catalogue, from a group show she had in Japan in 2002. She flicks to the back and shows me her work. It is a roll of Chinese silk, stretching the length of a room, covered in small black squares. At certain points the squares are almost entirely black, others only lightly shaded. Although it is geometrically constructed, the changes in tone suggest no overall pattern, and vary seemingly randomly over the length of silk. It is a simple but beautiful artwork, and impressive even in reproduction.

I’m interested to hear about the process of making an artwork of this scale. The image she shows me is one of 14 paintings. The series, she says, started in the year 2000, with each painting taking an entire year to complete. Each scroll is 82 feet long, and some years she finishes the length of the scroll, others she doesn’t; however much of the scroll is painted at the end of the year is the final state of the work. She describes the process of making the work as ‘continuous in time’, even though she may not paint a section every day. I ask her about the use of black paint, but she corrects me: she doesn’t use black, but a very dark grey colour, which can approximate more closely the different shades of black used in traditional Chinese painting. The use of this colour, she says, references that artistic tradition as well as being in some way elemental, or going back 'to the basics of things’. 

The dichotomy between ‘Western painting’ (xihua) and ‘Chinese painting’ (guohua) is still strong in China, and Chinese art students to this day are asked to choose one or the other when beginning their studies. Lu Qing’s work draws from both traditions, although the artistic decisions she makes are not the result of laborious or lengthly contemplation. In describing her practise, the word she uses most often is ziran, meaning ‘natural’ or ‘naturally’ (as in English, it can also refer to ‘nature’ or the natural world). Her choices of colour, form and style all presented themselves ‘naturally’ to her - all were very intuitive decisions. The decision to begin working on this series was itself also a natural one: she says she made no particular or conscious decision to begin these pieces, she just started one day. Her entire approach has this instinctive, intuitive quality, and it is refreshing to hear someone speak honestly and openly about their artwork without feeling the need for excessive conceptual justification. She says that, 14 years ago, she didn’t necessarily expect to continue the process for this length of time. Nor does she know how long it will go on for.

I ask her if, when complete, the paintings feel at all like a diary: although they are of course a record of experience, I’m interested to know if Lu Qing is able to ‘read’ them in some sense, and identify individual days or periods of time within the painting. She says that it is in some ways a kind of ‘abstract diary’, in that it represents an abstracted emotional record. She says that she never sees the entire piece at one time, unless it is exhibited, as each completed section is rolled up to allow her to continue working on the subsequent area. This in itself is also in-keeping with the Chinese tradition: while we are used to seeing Chinese scrolls ‘unrolled’ for display, this is not how they were traditionally seen or intended to be experienced. Scrolls were kept for private contemplation rather than public display, and were ‘read’ in small sections. After one section of scroll was examined, it was then re-rolled to allow for the reading of the next section. Unlike the Classical tradition in Western art (as it manifested in painting after the Renaissance), the Chinese traditional painter did not work with single point perspective. This single perspective necessarily locks the image to an isolated point in time; in Chinese painting, multiple perspectives are shown in the same image, implying movement in time. Further progression in time is then of course also suggested by subsequent sections of the scroll. Both kinds of representations of time are present in Lu Qing’s pieces, if in a paired-down form, where time itself becomes the subject of the work.

This is one reading at least. While the squares in Lu Qing’s work could be read as ‘units’ of time, other interpretations are possible. We may look at the expanse of carefully rendered squares and be reminded of pixels on a screen, or of modern technology in some form - a nice tension between that ‘modern’ association and the traditional scroll format - but in Chinese culture the square also has other, much older resonances. The ancient Chinese believed in a square shaped universe, and ancient Chinese cities were correspondingly constructed around squares of increasing size, with the Emperor at the centre (look at the map of Beijing: what are now traffic clogged ring roads where once ancient city walls). The Chinese writing system is itself also based on the same structure, with each character fitting within a square format. In the case of Lu Qing’s work is it this association that perhaps has the most relevance, as rather than readable characters that would fill each ‘square’ on the scroll, we are presented instead with a kind of private or abstract language. Throughout Chinese history, artists have often stressed the essential similarity between painting and writing, with both originating from the same source, and students of Chinese are still encouraged to think of Chinese characters as individual ‘paintings’. In order to be good at calligraphy this is precisely how you need to think of a Chinese character: as an individual painting in its own right, with its own internal logic, structure and composition. It is with the same care that each section of Lu Qing’s painting appear to be treated, although in a way in which she has pushed the ‘abstraction’ of the written language to its logical conclusion, and created a piece that is in some sense both ‘written’ and painted at the same time.

I ask her if she has any upcoming exhibitions where I can see her pieces, but she says that she doesn’t have any planned. In fact, it emerges that the small catalogue she showed me was the last time she exhibited anything, 12 years ago. Of the 14 years that she’s been working on this project, only two have been seen by the public: she explains that she has no desire or need to exhibit her work, and actively doesn't want to, as it is too personal for public display. For her the process of making these monumental paintings is itself part of the artwork, and this too is of course both a personal and private action. I ask if there is anything meditative about the process of painting these works, and she says that there is. This ‘meditative’ quality of their production again adds another level to their meaning. In Lu Qing’s practise the appearance of the final work and the entire process of making it are united to make a coherent whole: the fact that the piece is made by an individual artist, that it requires such enormous dedication in terms of time and labour, that the work itself relates to ‘time’ and represents a year in the life of the creator - all these things are important in understanding the work. I mention some of these things to her, along with the fact that I enjoy how she can start with something so simple - a single painted square - to make something so complex. She laughs and says she has never thought of it like that. All these aspects that lead to such a rich and interesting artwork were all just ‘natural’ to her, and didn’t require thought. Again it is hard not to connect what she says with some aspects of the Chinese tradition, and I am reminded not only of the Chan Buddhist tradition in Chinese painting, where artists would work instinctively and ‘naturally’, but also of the ‘artist recluse’, who is a central figure in Chinese artistic culture. Retreating from the public or political sphere, these ‘recluses’ were lauded for their commitment to their art, and came to serve as the embodiment of the Confucian moral conscience of the State. The ‘artist hero’, who in times of political turmoil was viewed as a symbol of resistance to tyranny, is also a recurring figure in Chinese history. Pursuing either of these ideas would however have to wait for another day.

I thank her for her time, and unfortunately have to leave the calm of the studio to go back to work. In the taxi back to the centre of Beijing I think over our discussion, and of how perfectly Lu Qing’s work exemplifies the kind of approach I found inspiring in Chinese art when I was a student. In my own artwork I tried, in some small way, to combine something of this approach with the social and political engagement I found so impressive in Ai Weiwei. I thought to mention this to Lu Qing, how several years ago I had once seen a photograph of a work that reminded me of hers, and how interesting I had found it, but I didn’t. It is after all bad form to tell an artist that their work reminds you of another artist’s work, and after Lu Qing had been so generous with her time and so willing to answer questions, I was cautious about saying anything that might offend her. Later that night I decided to try and find that image, to look up who that artist had been, and after some time I finally found it. I look at the caption. It reads: Lu Qing.

Celyn Bricker is an artist based in Beijing. www.celynbricker.co.uk!

With special thanks to Linda Yi for her invitation to lunch and her help with translation. See her

  Hester Reeve does the doors...came about because Suzie Silver and her then girlfriend Iris Moore were getting pissed that all the guys in the Chicago queer community were having their fun dressing in drag and women didn't have their equivalent. It seemed like yet another inequality. So they devised a night 'Bait and Switch' at Club Lower Links, a great underground venue in Chicago that opened only for a few years in the city's live art hey day. I was blessed enough to be studying and living there on and off during it. The audience was literally made up of the live art community and when you performed you didn't get paid – no one ever did - but you got a bottle of wine. I remember walking down a road on the southside one morning and a car screeched by, halted suddenly, reversed and Suzie stuck her head out the window and said "Hey Hester, do you want to do a drag lip sync next week for me? We’re having a meeting at club lower links on Monday night!". No admin or proposals in them days. Bait and Switch only happened once. I know Dani K also did a lip sync...there were a few others, but my mind is blank. Since my mind has focused back to that event, I have a sneaking feeling that photos were not taken. Someone we called Sherry compered. Mary Brogger had to be involved, so did Nancy Forest Brown, as they were always in the centre of things. They ran a fashion catwalk show first, where they dressed a group of us up as famous lesbians through out history and then after that some of us got up and did our own lip syncs as drag kings. The lip sync was my own creation, but it caused an incredible reaction that Suzie said she wanted to put it down on tape and I agreed she could turn it into a video piece. I've performed my drag king of the kings live at a few other venus and sometimes to other songs - PIL's Burn Hollywood Burn was one. Suzie shot me doing the performance for camera against a green screen at the Video Data bank in Chicago. All the back imagery is her work. I have a video of me doing Jesus live at Grunt, Vancouver later that year. I have images from Grunt but not digitized yet. I really need to sort my own archive out if I am honest. Much needs digitizing and even the digital now exists across boxes of floppy discs, CDs and folders on my laptop. But in that version I hid a camera in my loin cloth and ended by taking a photo of the audience. I liked the tension as I fumbled in my groin at the end, back to the audience. The faces on my breasts are angels, that look adoringly up to God...I incorporated them to push the gender fuck along - big boobs and yet a man, a top man god.

    …

    J2

Did you watch the video that I sent you?

  J1

Yeah I did

  J2

It’s funny isn’t it?

  J1

I really enjoyed it…drag queens to drag kings.

…

I was thinking after how there are so many different roles and bodies that perhaps we occupy multiple ones. Like an empty vessel that can be charged with…abled or disabled. In the video there are all of those images of women getting flashed in a kind of montage; they become recontextualised…they become almost disabled in that context.

  J2

That’s what is interesting about the contrast of placing her drag body over the top of these conventional ways of viewing women. And that’s the thing about abled and disabled bodies: how your subjectivity is modelled on what the norm is and how you fit into society. When something doesn’t it is like an anomaly or it’s wrong, it’s ill. It’s an ill body…

  J1

It’s revisiting ideas or ‘bringing in from a different time…’

  J2

Yes, the gap between the actual live performance and then this video that was modelled or based on the performance; a further fiction is created. There are all these chains – taking one element of it but then making it into something else. There is no genuine article; it just becomes this chain of derivatives from something live, a live conversation or interview, or a live performance in Chicago.

  J1

In which case I wonder then, if in this time and place, in this set-up, if there’s a coming together of Sandy Katz and Hester Reeve. If we have to create the fiction then they have to exist together.

  J2

That’s really true, but it’s also about ethics. How ethical is it to take these two pieces of material and treat it as plastic that you can just mould and shape as you will?

  J1

Because I naturally see one as the other now.

  J2

Yes, I do as well.

  J1

They coexist in my mind, as that’s the first time that I’ve seen either.

  J2

And that’s completely deliberate on Patrick’s part.

The edited conversation that you have just read forms a single iteration in a continuing chain of derivatives. The index of this chain is a meeting between Patrick Staff, Joseph Constable, and Jessica Dunleavy, which was then followed by a series of emails and Skype conversations. Patrick submitted two pieces of his research material: an edited excerpt from an interview between Sarah Schulman and Sandy Katz from the ACTUP oral history project (2004) and an edited email between Patrick and the artist Hester Reeve (2014).