Racing for the Intangible: the Nianhua Festival as Performative Statecraft

For its Convention for the Safeguarding of Intangible Cultural Heritage (2003),

UNESCO released a revised definition of ICH that marked a shift in discourse towards

recognizing the changing nature of ICH:

The practices, representations, expressions, knowledge, skills - as well as the

instruments, objects, artifacts, and cultural spaces associated therewith - that

communities, groups and, in some cases, individuals recognize as part of their

cultural heritage. This intangible heritage, transmitted from generation to

generation, is constantly recreated by communities and groups in response to their

environment, their interaction with nature and their history, and provides them

with a sense of identity and continuity, thus promoting respect for cultural

diversity and human creativity.322

In this reformulation, ICH is both “transmitted from generation to generation” and

“constantly recreated” in response to the present. In stressing the evolving and

contemporary nature of ICH, the revised definition offers a response to critiques

concerned with the “fossilization” of ICH as a result of heritage protection activities that

privilege certain traditional practices at the expense of emerging innovations. The

Convention also explicitly addresses the responsibility of the signatory states to deal with

the issue by safeguarding ICH in an inclusive rather than exclusive manner: “Each State

Party shall endeavor to ensure the widest possible participation of communities, groups,

and, where appropriate, individuals that create, maintain, and transmit such heritage, and

to involve them actively in its management.”323 In establishing these new guidelines,

322 “UNESCO Convention for the Safeguarding of the Intangible Cultural Heritage, Article 2, October 17,

2003,” accessed October 15, 2011,

http://portal.unesco.org/en/ev.phpURL_ID=17716&URL_DO=DO_TOPIC&URL_SECTION=201.html.

323 Ibid., Article 15.

UNESCO also launched a new round of list making, inviting submissions from around

the world to be officially recognized by UNESCO as a protected form of ICH. Eager to

gain as many spots as possible, the Chinese heritage bureaucracy leaped into action by

hosting heritage festivals, performances, conventions, and media campaigns to promote

various forms of ICH that embodied UNESCO’s definition. The notion of “cultural

diversity” 􀻓􀟄􀘟􁀢􀾟 became a key buzzword for promoting ICH in China, as it

highlighted both the inclusive stance of the state as well as the rich wealth of ICH within

Chinese territory.

Jumping into the game in 2002, Mianzhu’s Cultural Affairs Bureau inaugurated a

twenty-day Nianhua Festival 􀭍􀟂􀢫, an annual state-sponsored event that hires thousands

of performers to bring to life the theatrical imagery of historic nianhua works.324 The

annual festival repackages nianhua as a form of ICH with ties to the performing arts such

as regional theater, music, and dance. It also demonstrates the state’s efforts towards

embracing cultural diversity by drawing together many different cultural groups and

traditional performances. Despite its best efforts to present an image of a benevolent and

inclusive state, the Nianhua Festival’s tightly controlled stagecraft also betrays its

ideological statecraft.

While UNESCO’s push to recognize ICH was intended as a corrective to the

privileging of historic objects over embodied forms of cultural activity, the Nianhua

Festival continues to privilege the historic prints and paintings as the dominant themes

for the annual festival. In the same way that the Nianhua Village promotes the state

collection in its murals, the Nianhua Festival showcases the same pieces through

324 Wang Bing􀀁􀺦􀑢, "Mianzhu nianhua jie ji" 􀫥􁇰􀭍􀟂􀢫􀠺 [A record of Mianzhu's nianhua festival], in

Zhongguo Mianzhu nianhua 􁇏􀝓􀫥􁇰􀭍􀟂􀊦China's Mianzhu nianhua􀀾, ed. Yu Jundao 􁂿􀤮􀖡 (Beijing:

Zhongyang wenxian chubanshe, 2007), 208-211.

costumes, props, and performances based those historic works. For instance, in 2004 the

festival planners selected the painting Greeting Spring as the festival’s guiding theme.

The festival played a powerful role in publicizing (and authorizing) the painting’s status

as a form of tangible nianhua heritage as well as a record of its intangible heritage. In this

section, I will critique the festival’s selective approach to narrating the details of the

painting. In particular, the religious undertones of the lichun festival are omitted,

including the scenes of the magistrate receiving the spring deities or making offerings to

them before an altar. These activities still bear the taboo of feudal superstition in official

discourse although they clearly play a prominent role in the painting itself.325 While

censoring these scenes, the festival greatly amplifies the theatrical acts in the procession

scene of the painting, which includes music, theater, and acrobatics.

While the painting depicts a rather small-scale procession with less than fifty

people, the Nianhua Festival has expanded the procession to include several hundred

performers. For example, the painting depicts a small dragon-dance troupe according to

precise ritual protocol, including the auspicious number eight as embodied by eight

performers, the sculpted paper dragon effigy, and the masked performer who leads the

team (fig. 79). In the festival, however, most of these ritual markers are omitted. Instead

of an eight-person team, a much larger troupe was hired to carry a giant fabric dragon. In

restaging the procession scene in Greeting Spring, the Nianhua Festival downplays the

lichun festival’s ritual meaning and recasts the street performances as secular

325 The festival’s selective approach can be understood as part of the province’s long-standing policy to

strip cultural activities (such as printmaking, painting, theater, music, and other crafts) of their ritual

significance by recasting these industries in wholly secular terms as “art” or “live entertainment.” For a

discussion of theater reform in Sichuan and in China as a whole see Colin Mackerras, "Theatre in China’s

Sichuan Province," Asian Theatre Journal 14, no. 2 (1987) and —, "Tradition, Change, and Continuity in

Chinese Theater in the Last Hundred Years: In Commemoration of the Spoken Drama Centenary," Asian

Theatre Journal 25, no. 1 (2008).

entertainment. The historic two-day festival revolved around its proper timing with the

first day of spring on the traditional calendar and was closely tied to agricultural rites that

marked the beginning of the planting season. In contrast, the Nianhua Festival is a

twenty-day event that is scheduled to take place well in advance of this date, during one

of the busiest shopping seasons of the year in the run-up to the Spring Festival. Although

the festival claims to revive a historic practice, it in fact erases connections to the past by

producing a secularized and spectacularized entertainment-based heritage festival.

The selection of the Greeting Spring painting as a central theme for this highprofile

event also speaks to the painting’s potential as an ideological platform for the

festival’s political aims. In particular, the festival producers selected aspects of the

painting to perform and to narrativize its ideological message of “social harmony,” a

Confucian notion that has been gaining powerful traction in official discourse since the

early 2000s.326 The painting itself is a highly constructed image of an ideal Confucian

society. It can be historically situated within a trend of genre-paintings of prosperous

cities that circulated during the Ming and Qing dynasties, the most famous being

Qingming Shanghetu 􀱢􀫼􀴈􀞊􀹭 by the Northern Song painter Zhang Zeduan 􁅦􁄴􀘊. A

common feature of these paintings is the detailed depiction of urban spaces where people

of different class backgrounds are amicably engaged in diligent labor, exchange, travel,

and festive activities. These scenes of societal accord in urban life are in turn part of a

broader Confucian discourse among the elite that values harmonious hierarchy, loyalty,

and filial piety.

326 For a critique of the revival of Confucian ideals in national discourse and heritage programs, see

Sebastien Billioud and Joel Thoraval, "Lijiao: The Return of Ceremonies Honouring Confucius in

Mainland China," China Perspectives 4 (2009): 82-100; —, "Jiaohua: The Confucian Revival in China as

an Educative Project," China Perspectives 4 (2007): 4-20.

In Greeting Spring, the sense of congenial hierarchy is conveyed through the

dominant role of the magistrate in relation to the procession and its onlookers. The

exaggerated size of the magistrate’s figure underscores his authority as a benevolent

patriarch. He is also depicted with various accoutrements of status, such as his court robe,

cap, and glasses. His portly body shape, which is reminiscent of the wide and squat door

deity figures seen in Mianzhu, also calls up abundance and moral strength. Carried forth

by the procession and its various auspicious performances, the magistrate’s imperial

authority is paraded and glorified before a welcoming public. Every figure in the painting

is carefully depicted to reflect age, class status, and/or a clearly defined role in the

procession, making visible the well-ordered social hierarchy that supports the

magistrate’s position. As he appears before the spring deities to make sacrificial

offerings, the ceremony also associates the magistrate’s power with a divine mandate.

A similar message is narrated in the Nianhua Festival, where real officials replace

the role of the county magistrate seen in the painting. While the painting depicts the

magistrate in a tent or before an altar, the focal point of the Nianhua Festival is a large

stage for state officials and community leaders to greet the crowd (fig. 80). This stage is

used as a platform for various state officials to give speeches, and to announce the

festival’s goals “to develop the resources of traditional folk culture, to strengthen the

cultural industries, to expand cultural exchange and collaboration, and to raise Mianzhu’s

profile.” 327 While the performances recreate scenes from Greeting Spring to celebrate

local history, the insertion of real officials in the place of the magistrate’s figure situates

the historic festival in a contemporary context. In contrast to the performers in historical

costume, the officials perform their own positions of power as “real” leaders. As state

327 Wang, "A Record of Mianzhu's Nianhua Festival," 209.

officials ascend the stage to oversee hundreds of performers enacting auspicious street

theater, the festival celebrates the state’s command over a vast array of human and

cultural resources.328 This image has also been played up in the news coverage of the

event, where the Nianhua Festival has been lauded as a sign of economic prosperity due

to effective state leadership in the cultural domain.

According to Billioud and Thoroval, public heritage festivals across China have

advanced a new form of statecraft, where Confucian ideals are used to construct a

“national cultural narrative” and coherent national cultural identity as part of China’s

“soft power” strategies at home and abroad. The authors observe how during the 1980s,

the interest in Confucism was largely limited to tourism and academic endeavors, while

the 1990s and 2000s brought about greater focus on its political and symbolical

dimensions that promote the morally upright and benevolent character of the state. The

“holy city” of Qufu, Shandong, where Confucius was born and buried, has since been

transformed into a “symbolic city of Chinese culture.” An estimated thirty billion yuan

has been invested to build up Qufu’s heritage sites and museums, and to hold the annual

Confucius Culture Festival 􀥤􁈰􀻓􀟄􀢫. However, the appropriated Confucian messages

of harmony and openness contradict the “rigid bureaucratic procedures” that were

employed to manufacture consensus for these heritage activities.329

The unfolding trends in Mianzhu mirror the developments in Qufu as the state-led

nianhua revival increases its use of nianhua for ideological statecraft. As a nationally

recognized form of ICH, nianhua moves into different realms of political and economic

activity, from exported folk art to heritage tourism to staged culture festivals. Although

328 Such practices gained momentum and reached a height with the extravagant heritage performances

produced for the Olympics Games held in Beijing in 2008.

329 Billioud and Thoraval, "Lijiao: The Return of Ceremonies," 99.

UNESCO’s ICH guidelines specifically advocated for the “widest possible participation”

of community members and their active involvement in heritage management decisions,

the Nianhua Village and Nianhua Festival does little to address these issues. The state-led

efforts to embrace ICH continue to be exclusive and selective activities that are geared

toward promoting certain works in the state nianhua collection. The contradictions

between rhetoric and practice reveals how international agencies such as UNESCO

inadvertently catalyze and legitimize the very activities they seek to oppose.

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