East Asian Library, U.C. Berkeley
A partially-processed collection assembled by Ann Tompkins, a U.S. citizen invited to China after supporting the People's Republic of China at the 1965 World Peace Conference in Stockholm. She spent five years in Beijing teaching English, and returned several times subsequently. Her passion for the worker-friendly graphic art of China prompted her to accumulate what promises to be the largest U.S. collection of posters produced during the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution.
| Collection | Book | Catalog |
|---|---|---|
 These
posters were
donated to U.C. Berkeley's East
Asian Library and the Center for the Study of
Political Graphics. This collection was
featured
in the Winter 2007 EAL newsletter. |
 |
 |
|
"The
Ann Tompkins (Tang Fandi) and Lincoln Cushing Chinese
Poster Collection preserves a genre of art that was
known to and accepted by hundreds of millions of
Chinese during the years of the Cultural Revolution.
The posters’ images and the directives they supported
once influenced a quarter of the world’s population.
Anyone attempting to understand this period will want
to study these posters, not simply as illustrations of
the era but as expressions of its ideals and
vicissitudes. These posters were everywhere in China
during the Cultural Revolution. Although seldom
encountered today, they occupy an important place in
history and are a valued addition to the East Asian
Library’s collections." "The
holdings continue to grow, and a recent addition is a
highly valued collection of political posters from
China's Cultural Revolution that, as Zhou notes, vividly
convey the ideals and upheaval of what has been called
"the largest social-engineering effort in the history of
mankind." |
Chinese
Posters:
Art from the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution,
by Lincoln Cushing and Ann Tompkins, 2007. S.F. Chronicle book review
section comment: |
This entire collection has been digitized and is in the process of being cataloged. A web catalog is available here, with items listed by date. Posters from this collection have been
used for the covers of: Other Chinese poster article
links: |
  (left)
"Statement in Support of American Black People's
Anti-Repression Struggle"Larger view | Text translation |
||
this page is a Wikipedia resource on "Propaganda in the People's Republic of China"
updated 2/21/2023