Keeping Ahead of the Game

The Other China

遙遙領先

Lao Shu 老樹 is the nom de plume of Liu Shuyong (劉樹勇, 1962-), a Beijing-based artist, writer, critic and professor in communications. His artistic voice is unique and personal, its tenor, whimsy and profundity evoke what for decades we have called The Other China — a cultural noosphere that is as undeniably local as it is universal.

The inscription on the last painting in As the Year Flitters Away — Lao Shu’s Autumnal Hues, published on 10 December 2024, read:

Another year is all but gone,
more of the same old boring stuff.

Sitting alone here by the river
I’ll just focus on these plum blossoms.

Here we reach the end of the year 2024 again in Lao Shu’s company, his work offering a sardonic view of the sunny uplands of The Other China.

The following selection of Lao Shu’s paintings, poems and inscriptions is drawn from the artist’s Weibo account. It forms a pair with China’s Dark Enlightenment, a chapter in Xi Jinping’s Empire of Tedium in which we marked the seventieth anniversary of a defining moment in China’s headlong descent into intellectual and political obscurantism.

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The first day of January 2025 marks eight years since China Heritage went online. On the 29th of January, the first day of the Year of the Snake 乙巳蛇年, we will introduce China Heritage Annual 2025, the theme of which is New Sinology.

During 2025, we will celebrate two decades of New Sinology 後漢學, an approach to the study of and engagement with the Chinese and Sinophone world that featured in China Heritage Quarterly, the predecessor of China Heritage.

— Geremie R. Barmé
Editor, China Heritage
31 December 2024

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Lao Shu in China Heritage:

Also:

李承鵬年度總結：獻給我們的2024年，2024年12月29日

paintings and poems by Lao Shu

translated by Geremie R. Barmé

In a normal life that’s normally lived
you just gonna have to learn to cope.
So, pour yourself a cup of coffee and
get ready for another day at work.

— a casual sketch by Lao Shu, height of spring, Jiachen Year of the Dragon
published on 17 December 2024

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In a fucked up day and age such as ours
you never know who you might bump into.
Even when you’re just chilling in a café
a little bastard like this might do a turn.

— late summer, Renyin Year of the Tiger
published on 18 December 2024

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Looming clouds at dawn means it’s gonna snow,
a chilly branch hanging out in the mountains.
Back in the day you might catch sight of a beauty
Now you get nostalgic over a sprig of blossom.

— Lao Shu
published on 19 December 2024

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問：

國際問題有點亂，
估計也是不好辦。
國內形勢這麼好，
明年你想怎麼幹？

Query:

Internationally, things are in pretty much of a mess,
and it looks like there’s not a lot that can be done about it.
Meanwhile, however, here at home ‘the situation is excellent’.
So, the question is: what are your plans for the new year?

答：

國際國內先不說，
也別跟我談理想。
年底各處要用錢，
我只惦記年終獎。

Response:

Put all the geopolitics to one side for a moment,
and spare me the lecture on having lofty ideals.
At year’s end you need money for everything,
that’s why I’m focused on my annual bonus.

— published on 19 December 2024

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A lone traveller
no want for others.
A proud man standing tall
not held back by family.
Travelling these dusty paths,
confounded by all the chaos.
There’s no place to find refuge,
best just gallop off to Hexi.

When dust devils suddenly appear in Hexi everything
is obscured by bthe swirling sands and you start to fantasise …

— early in the Jiachen Year of the Dragon [2024-2025]
published on 25 December 2024

[Note: See also Only ever one step away — Lao Shu’s travels in time and space.]

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