Mao Zedong (2015)

Mao was born in central China on 26 December 1893 into a peasant family in Shaoshan, in Hunan province. After training as a teacher, he moved to the capital of China, Beijing, where he worked in the University Library. It was during this time that he began to read Marxist literature. In 1921, he became a founder member of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and set up a branch in Hunan. In 1923, the Kuomintang (KMT) nationalist party had allied with the CCP to defeat the warlords who controlled much of northern China. Then in 1927, the KMT leader Chiang Kai-shek launched an anti-communist purge.

The path of the communist leader was a sinuous one. Brief encounters with professors at the university, his time in the army, the jobs he took or his marriages – each, just like patches, made up his ascension as a founder of the People's Republic of China. Mirroring this hectic reaching, Vîrtosu translated it into pictorial language making use of colour relationships – one of his signature moves. Complementary transitions, vague and serene nuances, juxtaposed strokes and a joyous touch – Vîrtosu reflects upon the spirits of the time, the hopes and changes the regime was promising to the peasantry that was suffering from famine and poverty. Even though Zedong was responsible for the disastrous policies of the “Great Leap Forward” and the “Cultural Revolution”, the remainder of Maoism seems to resurge with an overarching buoyancy in the hearts of the young generation, one which is less familiar with the consequences the communist regime inflected upon its population. Rounding up to 50 million deaths, Mao Zedong was far from being a hero and Vîrtosu falls back on colour on purpose, in a rather sarcastic tone, emphasizing thus the contrast between appearances and reality of communist China.