Surrealism and the People's Republic of China Book Launch

Centre for Contemporary Visual Arts Asia Book Launch

Surrealism and the People's Republic of China: From Mao to Now

10th December 2025 5pm to 7pm Lecture Theatre, School of Art, Margaret Street, Birmingham City University. ALL WELCOME

Join us for Dr. Lauren Walden's book launch Surrealism and the People's Republic of China (Routledge) including an overview by the author and audience Q+A followed by a drinks reception.

This study investigates cultural exchange between the Surrealist movement and the People’s Republic of China (1949-present). This book asserts Surrealism resolutely chimed with traditional Chinese thought whilst reflecting and refracting contemporaneous socio-political issues from Mao to now. A ‘historico-intrinsic’ relationship coalesces archival and primary sources consulted in Chinese, French and English, artist interviews as well as cosmopolitan political theory. The purported originality of European modernism is questioned, ascertaining traditional Chinese concepts of spontaneity were cited by Surrealists as redolent of automatism, the notion of creating without forethought.
Surrealist art was officially prohibited under Mao’s rule (1949-1976). However, the book interrogates potent tensions in clandestinely created surrealist artworks by Zhao Shou and Sha Qi, who discovered the movement while studying abroad. Furthermore, Walden explores how several European Surrealists aligned Chinese calligraphy with automatism as well as Michel Leiris and Marcel Mariën’s travels to Maoist China and their diametrically opposed visions of the nation. Amidst post-socialism, the book posits that the ’85 New Wave consciously employed Surrealism to process the traumatic Cultural Revolution (1966-1976) and react to newfound societal freedoms. Subsequently, the volume considers why a new artistic tendency of ‘surrealist pop’ emerged in the 1990s. At present, Lauren Walden reveals how Surrealism has become officialised and even promoted by Chinese authorities owing to revolutionary resonances between traditional Chinese art and the western avant-garde.
The book will be of interest to scholars working in art history, Chinese studies, and Surrealism. Chapter 4 is available open access here as well as the introduction via a preview PDF : https://www.taylorfrancis.com/books/mono/10.4324/9781003382393/surrealism-people-republic-china-lauren-walden.

Please do consider ordering a copy for your library. Available in both hardback and as an ebook. A discount code 25AFLY4 is available with a 20% reduction on ebook and hardback copies. Thank you to the Leverhulme Trust for their support in bringing this monograph to fruition.
Dr. Lauren Walden is a Research Fellow in Contemporary Chinese Art at Birmingham City University, specialising in Chinese Surrealism from an art-historical perspective. Her first monograph Surrealism from Paris to Shanghai was published with Hong Kong University Press /Fondation Giacometti in 2024. Lauren is currently writing on the Chinese Reception of Henry Moore and has research interests in Taiwanese Surrealism.

For any access, dietary requirements or other queries please get in touch with the author on [email protected]

Thank you.

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