Miao girl with pig on leash, Pang Xunqin (1944-45), in Sisters, Brothers, Others at The Ashmolean. Photo ©Jonathan Turton, 2026
Oxford was full of Chinese tourists, yet just one young couple had made their way to Gallery 11 at the Ashmolean. This exhibition – timely, given the recent significant change in Chinese law on national ethnic integration – is a subtle collection of mostly 20th-century works. It looks with studied care at how minority ethnic groups in China have represented themselves and been represented in art. It would need a scholar to extract the multiple layers of meaning behind much of this work, though each print, woodblock, poster, painting and even matchbox comes with insightful analysis.
Two things leapt out: first, how artists have used Chinese artistic traditions to either subvert or honour minority communities; second, that among the depictions of ‘safe’ cultural traditions there was an absence of overt resistance art – perhaps outside the remit of this exhibition.
This temporary exhibition deserves time spent reading as well as looking. Gallery 11 is only small – and you may have it to yourself.
Interesting and loaded with nuance 7/10