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Identification and Creation

Object Number
2012.194.1-3
People
Lee Chun-Yi (Li Junyi) 李君毅, Chinese (Gaoxiong (Kao-hsiung), Taiwan born 1965)
Title
Ten Thousand Years, Ten Thousand Years of Sleep, One Hundred Million Scattered Pieces
Classification
Paintings
Work Type
painting, hanging scroll
Date
2009
Places
Creation Place: North America, United States, Arizona, Tempe
Culture
Chinese
Persistent Link
https://hvrd.art/o/342698

Physical Descriptions

Medium
A set of three hanging scrolls forming a triptych; ink on paper; with artist's signature reading "Erlinglingjiu nian chun Li Junyi shi yu Meiguo Fenghuangcheng"
Dimensions
Overall: H. 288 x W. 285.7 cm (113 3/8 x 112 1/2 in.)
Inscriptions and Marks
  • inscription: The triptych’s central painting includes a long inscription (comprising 180 characters) in the rectangular border that surrounds the work. The inscription begins in the border’s upper right corner and continues all the way around the painting (reading from top to bottom along the left edge, from right to left across the bottom, from bottom to top along the right edge, and from left to right across the top). The artist’s dated signature appears at the end of that inscription; the signature, which reads from left to right, comprises characters two through sixteen, counting from the top right square—that is, counting backward vis-à-vis the flow of the text.: 毛澤東，字潤之，一八九三年生於湖南湘潭。為中國共產黨領導人。四九年中華人民共和國成立後，任中央人民政府主席。曾發動大躍進、農村人民公社化運動、反右傾鬥爭等；復掀起文化大革命，一時群眾狂呼毛主席萬歲，並喻之為紅太陽。然今日觀之，其歷史功過實多有爭議之處。因有感而製三屏連作，題為「萬歲，萬睡，萬萬碎」。原作為一九八八年於香港中文大學之畢業作品，今應哈佛大學毛瑞先生委託而重製，二零零九年李君毅識於美國鳳凰城。
    The inscription, date, and signature can be translated as:
    Mao Zedong, zi Runzhi, was born in Xiangtang, Hunan province, in 1893. He was the leader of the Chinese Communist Party. After the establishment of the People’s Republic of China in 1949, he served as the Chairman of the central government. Mao advocated a series of political campaigns, including the Great Leap Forward, People’s Communes, and Anti-Rightists. He also launched the Cultural Revolution, during which his personality cult reached its height. People worshipped Mao as a living god, calling him the “Red Sun.” Today, there is considerable controversy concerning his historical legacy. As a personal response, I did a triptych entitled “Ten Thousand Years, Ten Thousand Years of Sleep, Ten Thousand Times Ten Thousand Scattered Pieces.” I painted the original version of this triptych in 1988 as my graduation project at the Chinese University of Hong Kong; I have now re-created a new one at the request of Mao Rui [Robert D. Mowry] of Harvard University. Chun-yi Lee [Li Junyi] recorded this in Phoenix, USA in 2009.
  • signature:

    : Although the landscape scrolls lack inscriptions and signatures, each has an “implied signature” in the form of a blank grid square that could accommodate a seal, though it should be noted that no seal was impressed. The blank square is in the lower right corner of the right-hand painting; the related square is in the lower left corner of the left-hand painting.
    [blank square]
  • inscription: Each scroll bears on its exterior a title slip inscribed by the artist, which includes his name, the title of the work, the designation of the scroll’s position vis-à-vis the others in the set—i.e., right, center, left—and the year the works were created [2009].: 李君毅“萬歲, 萬睡, 萬萬碎” 右軸 (or 中軸or 左軸, as appropriate) 二0 0 九年 [Li Junyi, "Ten Thousand Years, Ten Thousand Years of Sleep, One Hundred Million Scattered Pieces", right (or center or left, as appropriate), 2009]
  • chop: Three characters appear throughout the portrait, both in the portrait of Chairman Mao and in the disc above—one character within each square of the grid, arranged in random order; they also appear in random orientations, some right side up, others upside down, and yet others sideways: 毛澤東 [Mao Zedong]

Provenance

Recorded Ownership History
Artist Chun-yi Lee (also spelled Li Junyi), 2009, sold; to Robert D. Mowry, MA (2009-2012), gift; to Harvard Art Museums, 2012.

Acquisition and Rights

Credit Line
Harvard Art Museums/Arthur M. Sackler Museum, Gift of Robert D. Mowry in honor of Chu-tsing Li and in memory of Yao-wen Kwang Li
Copyright
© Lee Chun-yi
Accession Year
2012
Object Number
2012.194.1-3
Division
Asian and Mediterranean Art
Contact
am_asianmediterranean@harvard.edu
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Descriptions

Description
This triptych comprises a set of three hanging scrolls, each painted in ink on paper. The central scroll is a formal portrait of Mao Zedong (1893–1976); the flanking scrolls represent landscapes. The Mao portrait is based both on the official portrait photograph of Mao Zedong that was taken in 1959 by Xinhua News Agency photojournalists Meng Qingbiao (1925–1969) and Ho Bo (born 1924) and on the official portrait painting of Chairman Mao that that was created in 1959 by Zhang Zhenshi (1914–1992), a professor at the Central Academy of Arts and Crafts, Beijing, based on the official portrait photograph. The portrait presents a bust-length, frontal portrait of Chairman Mao, his head and shoulders turned slightly, almost imperceptibly, to his proper right. His hair is combed straight back, his eyes are fully open, and his mouth suggests a slight smile. He wears a Mao jacket, buttoned all the way to the top; one circular button appears in the inverted “V” formed by the two downward-projecting points of the collar. Perhaps part of the Mao-jacket collar, perhaps the top of a collar of a shirt worn under the jacket, a slender white line encircles Chairman Mao’s neck, readily distinguishing garment from flesh. A circular black disc appears in the center of the otherwise unembellished white paper above Chairman Mao’s head. The background area of the portrait—but not the area above the portrait—are fully textured, so that the image of Chairman Mao emerges from a gray background. The characters that appear throughout the painting, both in the portrait of Chairman Mao and in the disc above—i.e., one character within each square of the grid—read Mao Ze Dong; arranged in random order, they also appear in random orientations, some right side up, others upside down, and yet others sideways. The “texturing characters” appear in the image of Mao, in the background areas, and in the disc above but are most evident in the background areas and in the disc. A long inscription comprising 180 characters appears in the rectangular border surrounding the painting. A narrow strip of unembellished white paper appears just inside the border, clearly differentiating border from portrait.

Each landscape scroll presents a view into a deep mountain valley that recedes distantly into the pictorial space. Each landscape is a bilaterally symmetrical rendition of the other, so that the landscapes are mirror images of each other. Appearing black and positioned at the “inside edge” of each landscape composition—i.e., on the side of the composition opposite from the blank grid square that is an “implied seal” (see description below)—a towering foreground peak partially blocks the view of the mountain range that rises on one side of the valley. Silhouetted against the receding valley, old pines grow around the periphery of the foreground peak and around the top of the shorter peak that accompanies it. When the landscape scrolls are hung on either side of the central scroll, the dark, foreground peaks frame the Mao portrait. A rectangular area of blank paper appears above each landscape, and a dark border frames each composition and the accompanying blank paper above, a narrow strip of unembellished white paper separating border from landscape, the arrangement echoing that of the central, portrait scroll.

The artist did the “original version” of this triptych in 1988 in fulfillment of requirements for his bachelor of arts degree at the Chinese University of Hong Kong. The artist sold the Mao portrait from that set to Kingsley Liu, a Hong Kong collector of contemporary Chinese ink paintings; the artist still owns the two landscapes from the original set. The artist originally was thinking of simply painting a new Mao portrait, which he would pair with the existing, original landscape paintings (from 1988) for this set (which was commissioned twenty years after the original set; however, upon re-examining the landscape scrolls, which had been stored in Hong Kong, the artist discovered that they sustained water damaged while stored. Thus, the artist created an entirely new set in 2009.

The artist has stated that although this work is a triptych and although he would prefer that the scrolls be exhibited as a set, in fact, the scrolls may be exhibited in whichever arrangement or grouping that curators would like; thus, the scrolls may be shown individually, just as the two landscape scrolls may be exhibited as a pair (without the central portrait of Mao).

Related Works

Verification Level

This record has been reviewed by the curatorial staff but may be incomplete. Our records are frequently revised and enhanced. For more information please contact the Division of Asian and Mediterranean Art at am_asianmediterranean@harvard.edu