Through the past decade, Yue Minjun has held a unique position in China’s contemporary art circle, primarily

because of his lively images and distinctive style. This position is not only a magnification of his “self-image” but further, explicitly demonstrates certain trademark features of the market. In Yue Minjun’s art, the exaggeration of the “self-image” has proved to be an effective market strategy. In addition to being a cultural referent, the “self-image” is an important and dynamic factor in the market economy system, which is a conduit to understanding the development of China’s contemporary art through the 1990s.

Since the early 1990s, Yue Minjun has devoted himself to building an exaggerated “self-image” on canvas, which has extended in recent years into his sculpture as well as a large series of silk-screen prints. At times “it” is presented alone, and at other times repeated to create a crowd effect. This “self-image” may beam with its eyes closed, or playact, but either way the mood is of enormous confidence. “It” emerges in certain settings which are, in a sense, the space within which and background against the Chinese culture developed amidst struggle in the 1990s. Particularly in respect fo the class status, the history of growth, of cultural relationships between the East and West, the difference between male and female, and economic and political (violent) events engendered by globalization. All these settings are transformed into or reduced to games as the “self-image” is magnified. “I” seem not to live in the environment but just happen to appear here.

In the “self-image”, the eyes are always tightly shut, and whatever takes place outside is not important to “me” at all. Centered in the world lies the narcissistic, self-assured and overwhelming “I”, the “self” in contemporary Chinese art. It is not the discovery of a respect for individual personal values, but a cult of personality bearing a touch of absolutism. The personality cult originates from a kind of desire for theatrics that arises when people are materially satisfied under certain market conditions. The “self” turns into a magnified form of the self, a “hero”, and something that needs a stage to play on. The “self” does not possess a specific social identity or has not yet formed one; the “self” is the most generalized thing and is the maximized personality cult with striking features of post-absolutism. Yue Minjun himself calls it a “new idol” and explains his work as the creation of “new idols”.

With a concrete and magnified image, the idolized “self” has found its attribute of certain class and culture on the world stage, which can be regarded both as the initial and immediate positioning of Chinese artists in the process of globalization, and as the self-definition of Chinese contemporary art. However, the “new idol” is hard to define. It is more like the branding of a trademark so necessary if it is to be distinguished more quickly, easily and directly. In this sense, comparison with the US-based Thai contemporary artist Udomsak Krisanamis might be interesting. Krisanamis styles himself like a bourgeois golf player, well educated and elegant in dress. Different from the vagrant and rebellious images of artists in the times of modernism, he sees himself as a member of extremely commercial times, trying to tell people he is a steadfast supporter of social order of which he takes pleasure in being a member.