EACS-2016. Book of Abstracts

21st Biennial Conference of the European Association for Chinese Studies 74 Amblard Bérangère (IETT Lyon) Spectacle of the Body and Body on Stage in Chinese Contemporary Art Key words: China, contemporary art, spectacle, body, theatricalisation In a country of 1.3 billion people, “bodies are everywhere”. This statement, made by Henry Perrier, cura- tor of the exhibition Chine, le corps partout [China, the Body Everywhere], which took place in Marseille, France, in 2004, is particularly relevant. Traditional Chinese art and painting do not focus on humans but are centered on landscapes depiction. Humans only constitute a minute component of the prints and their presence is often justified by practical reasons. Acting as referents, they create a scale in the paintings, their smallness contrasting with the immensity of nature. However, over the past twenty years, the human figure and its representation became predominant in a lot of contemporary Chinese artists work. It revealed a multiplicity of pilled up, deformed, disguised, fragmented, often nude bodies. Omnipresent, the body not only is the piece of art’s content but came to be its medium. Moreover, the body, and quite particularly that of the artist, turned into a place of all the manifestations and questioning. Artists tended to involve their own body in their creations, putting it on stage. Whether paintings, performances or photography, they set up a theatrical atmosphere in the pieces of art. The body is the centre of attention shown, exposed naked to the spectator’s eyes. Engaged in Zhang Huan’s 張洹 performative experiences it evolves on stage in front of an audience. Yue Minjun 岳敏君 and Zeng Fanzhi 曾梵志 frequently use painted masks to cover their characters’ face. Cang Xin 苍鑫 puts on different peo- ple’s costume becoming an actor, a comedian of the artwork theatre. In a country that recently took place in the integrated spectacle of society, it is the artistic spectacle of the body that I would like to question. Anderl Christoph (Ghent University) Narrative Tableaux in Yulin Cave 33: An Analysis of Structure and Contents Key words: Yulin caves 榆林窟 ; Buddhist wall paintings; narrative tableaux; Subjugation of Māra Tableau 降魔變相 ; Dunhuang art Yulin 榆林 Cave 33 in Gansu province (the Yulin grottoes site is situated in ca. 250 km distance from the main Buddhist cave site of that region, the Mogao caves 莫高窟 ) was constructed in the middle of the 10th century, at the height of power of the Cao 曹 family, which quasi-independently ruled over the region of Shazhou 沙洲 (with Dunhuang as its “capital”) after the end of the Tibetan rule over that area. This period is also characterized by very close relations between the Chinese in Shazhou and the King of Khotan, as well as the intensification of diplomatic and family relations between the aristocratic families of the two regions along the Silk Road. During that period, Buddhist cave art production was peaking, and the political alliances were directly mirrored in the iconographic program of the grottoes constructed during that time. Whereas the contents of many Yulin caves is similar to those of the Dunhuang Mogao site constructed during the same period, there are also special features which can be observed in the art production of Yulin. In my paper I will give an overview of the structure and iconographic program of Cave 33 which is characterized by containing a variety of specific narratives projected on the murals, most importantly the Oxhead Mountain Tableau and the Subjugation of Māra Tableau, two tableaux facing