Picturing Mao: styles and functions of depicting Mao Zedong’s visual image up to 1966

Gipson, Ferren Mariah

Abstract

This thesis examines photographs, nianhua posters, ink paintings and oil paintings of Mao Zedong produced up to 1966 to interrogate each medium’s ideological functions, reconsider their position within the wider lineage of traditional Chinese art conventions beyond their role as propagandistic tools, and identify how power is transferred through the production and content of these images. This research focuses on Mao imagery created prior to the Cultural Revolution between 1949 and 1965, as the images spanning this period have not previously been the subject of an extensive, cohesive art historical study.
Each of the chapters present artwork interpretations that integrate the perspectives and stylistic aims of the artists alongside the objectives and ideologies of Mao and the party, contextualising these findings with contemporaneous texts from art journals, magazines, newspapers, biographical information, artist accounts, official policies, and talks by Mao and other key party officials. This thesis identifies the ideological contradictions inherent in the stylistic practices of the period and presents an argument for how Mao images were shaped by modern and traditional art conventions, cultural traditions, and emerging political issues.
The thesis also outlines the reasons and means by which Mao increasingly employed his visual image as a tool to further his Great Leap Forward initiative, address the Sino-Soviet Split, and sustain power in the 1950s and early 1960s, identifying the 1956 photograph of Mao swimming in the Yangtze River as a watershed instance of Mao taking a more active role to leverage his visual image in support of these efforts. Through formal analysis of Mao images across mediums—including images where Mao’s presence is implicit—this study examines how audiences can observe within the material images the ways in which Mao images functioned to support his political agenda, accentuate his status as a new form of scholar-official for the modern age, and ultimately aid him in sustaining supreme power.

Citation

Gipson, F. M. Picturing Mao: styles and functions of depicting Mao Zedong’s visual image up to 1966. (Thesis). SOAS University of London

• Thesis Type: Thesis
• Deposit Date: Jun 17, 2025
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.25501/SOAS.00506044
• Additional Information: 290 pages
• Award Date: 2025