The Art of Anxiety: China's Social Transformation and the Uncertain Reception of Chinese Contemporary Art

ABSTRACT

In this essay I will argue that Chinese contemporary art since the 1980s has been characterized by a collective outlook analogous to the psychological symptom of anxiety and that this collective outlook drives Chinese artists to make art as a critical proof of their particular conditions of being and identity.

摘要

在本文中，笔者将论证中国当代艺术是如何从80年代便被赋予了一种集体 性的面貌，其具有类似于心理学上的焦虑症状；而这样的集体面貌驱使了中 国艺术家将艺术作为他们对于自身的特殊存在和身份认同的批判性的证明。

KEYWORDS:

• anxiety
• contemporary Chinese art
• opening and reform policy
• social system
• identity

关键词:

• 焦虑
• 中国当代艺术
• 改革开放政策
• 社会体制
• 认同