New Bookshelf 丨 "Cliffside 2: The Village in Art" deeply interprets the relationship between art, land and people

Cover news reporter Wang Hui

How did Beijing Tongzhou Songzhuang become the cradle of Chinese contemporary art? Why is Yunnan Guangkun's pig's nest coffee popular? How did the ancient village of Xiadi, Fujian Province, turn decadence into vitality? Guangxi Normal University Press's new book "Cliffside 2: Villages in Art" selects six typical cases from all over the country and focuses on the achievements of art township construction.

Six artists, six art villages with their own characteristics. In the book, representative practitioners, such as Xu Hongbin, Cheng Meixin, Li Xiangming and other artists, use a variety of artistic methods to awaken the countryside and provide case demonstrations and experience guidance.

Through art exhibitions, ancient building renovations, folk art development, aesthetic education construction, etc., artists intervene in the countryside, presenting the implementation process of their art township construction projects, as well as the various problems encountered in the process, the ideas for solving problems, the summary and reflection of experience, etc., and interpreting the relationship between art, land and people.

The artists' practice and reflection continue the ideals of Yan Yangchu, Lu Zuofu, Liang Shuming and other predecessors, and reflect on the power that art gives to rural rejuvenation, providing a useful reference for the construction of Rural Culture in China.

In addition, the book is accompanied by 32 color illustrations, pictures and texts, which more vividly, three-dimensionally and intuitively show the process and achievements of various art rural construction cases. This is the first documentary literature MOOK book focusing on local civilization, advocating that more people pay attention to the roots of Chinese civilization and sort out the ideological and cultural resources that can help modernization. Strive to break the boundaries, form a "cross-border humanistic and artistic expression community", based on the new countryside, create new literature and art, and cultivate new youth.

Yan Haijun, author of Cliffside 2: Villages in Art, is a well-known non-fiction writer, a member of the Chinese Writers Association, the editor-in-chief of Cliffside Mook, and one of the initiators of the "National Hometown Love Literature and Culture Group". He is the author of "Cliffside Report: Fission Records of Native China", "In the Official Wall: One Man's Countryside and City", and "Longzhong Craftsmanship". His works have been shortlisted for the "11th Wenjin Book Award", won the 9th Dunhuang Literature and Art Award, and the first prize of the 6th Gansu Yellow River Literature Award. "Cliffside Report" was listed in the "2015 Chinese Good Books and Social Science Top Ten Good Books", "2015 Phoenix Non-fiction Top Ten Good Books", "Chinese and Foreign Digest" 2015 Top Ten Good Books, 2015 Nandu Good Book List Top Ten Good Books (Social Science Category) and so on.

Wen Tiejun, an expert on China's three rural issues, and Han Shaogong, a well-known writer and critic, jointly recommended and served as consultants for this book.

Han Shaogong said: "The living method is the writing method, and life is the article." These are words written to the earth by some actors and doers, simple in tongue, luxurious in the mind and body, and read with great bloodshed. ”

Wen Tiejun believes: "Rural culture is the richest connotation of Chinese civilization, belonging to both villagers and outsiders; as a result, a large number of cultural people with citizen identity go to the countryside and combine with cultural people with peasant identity." Since everyone is a "Cliffside" cultural person, why should they have known each other! We are happy to see that the integration of urban and rural areas is a process of joyful harmony like the meeting of Queqiao..."