Appalling old waxworks
The show is a prelude to China in London 2006, a season of events celebrating Chinese arts and culture and China's historic links with the British capital.īy associating himself with the exhibition, Hu is, in effect, positioning himself as the legitimate heir to the country's imperial past.Īs China's economic expansion brings it into closer contact with the West, its leaders are increasingly seeking to bolster their positions by promoting a historicised image of their country that has little to do with contemporary reality. Hu was in London last month to promote business links with the United Kingdom, China's third-biggest trading partner.Īt the same time, he opened the Three Emperors exhibition at the Royal Academy of Arts, a lavish display of treasures from China's last imperial dynasty, including paintings, jades, bronzes, porcelain and ceremonial robes. Yet the message they put across is often highly confusing. China's leaders want to challenge this stereotype and convince Westerners that the country's inhabitants are just like everyone else - willing participants in the global economy.
A bear-like man given to bursting into song, he strikes most Chinese as a buffoon rather than a stuffed dummy.Ĭhina's current President, Hu Jintao, who visited London in November, is no waxwork either: young and energetic, he presents himself as managing director of China Inc, the world's fastest-growing corporation.Ĭharles's use of the term "waxworks" expresses a Western view of the Chinese as stiff, formal and inscrutable. Yet Jiang Zemin, the president at the ceremony Charles attended in 1997, hardly fits that description. In his recently published diary entry about the handover of Hong Kong, Prince Charles described the Chinese leadership as "appalling old waxworks".
IT'S DIFFICULT TO CUT THROUGH THE SPIN TO FIND A REALISTIC DEPICTION OF CHINA, XIAO JIA GU WRITES.