Chinese women artists’ Marxist feminist critique of post-socialist work

Linzhi Zhang

LSE Research Online Documents on Economics from London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library

Abstract: Amidst the growing interest in Chinese women artists’ feminist interventions, this article delves into a less-explored theme in their artistic practices: labour. Through a close examination of two artists’ critical engagement with women’s labour in China, I highlight their Marxist feminist concerns. The first artist, Hu Yinping, creates a work utopia that ensures work autonomy for her mother who had taken on precarious part-time jobs after being laid off. The second artist, Feng Lin, appropriates ready-mades derived from a housewife’s life for her critical enquiry into whether domestic labour or home truly shields women from capitalist relations. It is argued that the two artists make women’s problems with work visible in a post-socialist China, where women’s labour becomes increasingly devalued, less conspicuous, and more precarious. Furthermore, both artists experiment with alternatives to capitalist commodified labour. However, it becomes apparent that Hu Yinping cannot sustain her utopian vision without selling her labour as an artist, and Feng Lin demonstrates that a housewife cannot fully escape the capitalist imposition of work. Ultimately, the interventions of these artists serve as a dual critique of capitalist labour and a revelation of its totality.

Keywords: artistic labour; contemporary Chinese art; gender; labour; Marxist feminism; women artists (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: J01 R14 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 22 pages
Date: 2024-12-25
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Published in China Information, 25, December, 2024, 39(1), pp. 53-74. ISSN: 0920-203X

Downloads: (external link)
https://researchonline.lse.ac.uk/id/eprint/140272/ Open access version. (application/pdf)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:ehl:lserod:140272

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in LSE Research Online Documents on Economics from London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library LSE Library Portugal Street London, WC2A 2HD, U.K.. Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by LSERO Manager ().