Connect with us

Hi, what are you looking for?

top

Focus on China

China’s Cultural Revolution, now highly collectible

– Mao and a mango –

For some buyers, such objects tap into nostalgia for a simpler time, when the state provided everything and society was more equal, despite the abuse the victims suffered.

“It was an exciting time for kids,” Guo said. “Most collectors now are old people, younger people lag behind.”

The objects on offer range from an enamelled metal plate with the slogan “Chairman Mao’s revolutionary art and literature line victory forever” to a book of cartoons published in early 1977, soon after Mao’s death and the fall of his widow Jiang Qing.

Along with the three other members of the “Gang of Four”, she was officially blamed for directing the mayhem. Once a movie actress in Shanghai, she was among a cabal of radicals with links to the city who were among the driving forces behind the Cultural Revolution.

“We can remember history,” Guo said.

On a high bookshelf in the shop, a framed picture shows Mao with a mango, which became an object of veneration after the leader gifted the fruit to a group of workers in 1968.

The cult of the mango, as it is known, was even the subject of an exhibition at the Museum Rietberg in Zurich in 2013.

The reproduction sells for 50 yuan ($8), Guo says – but an original would cost hundreds of dollars.

Advertisement. Scroll to continue reading.

The disparity offers an opportunity for the unscrupulous to profit, and collectors and dealers said that rampant fakes are a problem for Cultural Revolution memorabilia, like other collecting categories in China.

On Chinese website Kongfz.com, an eBay-like platform for antiquarian books and other items, a search for Cultural Revolution turns up nearly 200,000 items with the most expensive an extensive collection priced at 3.0 million yuan.

About The Author

Pages: 1 2 3

Comments
Advertisement

More on Capital News