A revolutionary day
A revolutionary day
“We can be heroes, just for one day” David Bowie
This was a normal day, a day I will always remember, a revolutionary day, and even though I was an outsider it was easy to belong to “smart people” on that one day.
Background
Smart people are a well-known group of people in China that have a distinct culture and sense of identity. In the mainstream eye these people are seen as annoying, undesirable, even crazy, they represent uneducated, unsocialized minority, what is important to note is that this group was formed on the internet. We can trace it to the Tencent company products like Q Zoom and QQ Chat groups in the early two-thousands. We can also trace visual identity of smart people to that time and the Japanese Glam-rock band culture, and some people point out that stye vise we can definitely see the influence of punk. As far as the social economics background of the members of this movement, most of them come from rural areas of China, young people from villages that found a chance to get in touch through the internet. They are usually the children of the migrant workers, a big group of people in China that are working in the big cities to support family in the rural parts. They usually have stopped their formal education and have in turn become migrant workers themselves. It can also be interesting that the internet access, at that time, was usually in the form of internet cafes that were in-between cities and villages. The height of this group’s popularity were 2000ths, and as the time passed there were less and less of them. Now we can only see the remnants of this subculture in Dongguan, Shipai village, where we can personally witness the extinction of the fringe culture of early 2000s.
Smart people were not excepted by other developing subcultures of that time, the cosplay scene, the hip-hop scene and the traditional chinses costume scene of the early Internet China all look down on the smart people, as ones that were somehow below the rest. Due to their economic relevance, as to say they are viewed as something normal because they can sell. On the other hand, smart people never produced something that they could sell, and they lost this capitalistic race. The “products” of this culture are the characteristic style and esthetic that are connected with the identity of the members of the culture. one more thing that we may consider as a product is a specific type of Chinse characters, called huoxingwen (letters-characters from Mars). They combine different characters in Chinese language (resembling complicated characters) that would be difficult to read for an average person, making for some very interesting calligraphy.
The intergroup workings of “Smart people” are unique and an absolute opposite to how main society see them. Among the group the prevailing narrative is that they are noble and that they live the life of luxury. They use complicated titles as a display of nobility, like “bleeding love princess” or “bleeding love angel”, using them to assert their place in the society they created. I find it quite beautiful to see that they use this virtual world they created as a push back to the real world that discriminates them, and as a push back to the socioeconomic togetherness created in the early day of the expansion of the Chinese internet hold even today, and I was able to take part in it.
A revolutionary day
Couple of things happened recently that brought my attention back to “Smart people”. We Were Smart “A documentary exploring this subculture by a professor in Sichuan academy and my colleague LIYING FAN, brought them into the eyes of the public again. At the same time, I was familiar with another director’s work, my friend, Tengyu HAN, from Beijing Film university. Her body of work deals with street culture and she has been staying with smart people for 2 months at that time researching for her next documentary film. Having all of this information, when I was invited to participate in an exhibition in ShenZhen which is not far from DongGuan, I decided to try to visit and meet with “Smart people”.
I got in touch with Tengyu Han and LIyi Fan, and I got Luo Fuxing s contact. Luo Fuxing is the “godfather” of Smart people, he coined the name, put the “smart”in smart people, and is the leader of the group. We talked a little, and I found out that unfortunately he might not be there when I come, since he has to attend his grandfather funeral. This curbed my enthusiasm a little but I made plans with Tengyu Han to visit the village where most of “Smart people” are located, she arranged us to meet some of them and we had plans to spend the day together in Shipai park, where most of “Smart people” hangout together, This chance to go and meet them, to become friends was a huge deal to me. I was so happy and excited. Then I got in touch with Li Jinghu and ECHO from Alternative art space “Shimi”in DONGGUAN, they can me when we go to visit them.
I took a taxi to from Shenzhen to Dong Guan, after a two hours trip Echo was there in Dongguan art space waiting for me, and Teng Yuhan and Luo Fuxing were already at SHIPAI village waiting for me, so I was in a rush to get there as soon as possible, and luckily Echo could drive me there. I was hoping we could get there in time to have a meal together. they were two of them were having a local favorite, pork bone porridge. Even though we came just as they were finish, we had a short meeting there, so I was able to have bowl of it.
That was the first time I meet Luo Fuxing in person. In our WeChat conversation I gathered that most of smart people were very sensitive, maybe a response to the world that was not the kindest to them. Luo Fuxing as a godfather of this group, had all of these characteristics but was also used to talking to people, he was quick to respond and quick to make judgments. After introducing myself he noted that I am an offensive person, trying to take something from them. He told me I was not funny at all, nor am I interesting person. I chose to interpret that as his defensive mechanism at work, trying to protect himself and the rest of his group from the outside. In that moment, I was getting a bit angry, but with the anger came curiosity, I was determent to prove myself, showing him some of my works, how I like to play with my hair and my personal style and this seemed to get us somewhere, at least he was more interested now. The rest of the conversation was interesting, not so much pleasant,. My imprisons were actually positive. After we had eaten, Yuhan invited us to go to a hair salon to get all smart-up. Echo was driving us to the hair salon and Luo Fuxing seemed happy, possibly because we got a car, that could be a status symbol in the village which brings us to the next important thing that Luo Fuxing talked about. He is very motivated to earn money. He tried selling hairspray with his image, he tried to negotiate with a brand selling cocktail for using the “smart” in their campaign but he was not able to come to agreement. He was happy do any sort of art collaboration with me, thinking we could partner with my collage and sell tickets, or we could sell something to people in Beijing.
We got to the salon called MINGLIU, the free translation would be someone we call celebrity, someone indulging in luxury and vanity. The picture was quite beautiful, this small country hair salon but with a luxury celebrity name. This is nothing new in rural China, quite often you can see names such as “Mona Lisa” for photo studios or names like “Christal paradise” for places where you can take showers. A hairdresser form Hehan province got to work at our hair, he moved here because he’s good at creating smart people hairstyles, and Luo Fuxing suddenly decided that he needed a little break and he took off, left us there.
This left me to gather my impressions. Luo Fuxing was vocal in his critic of art, he had an idea of what art should be, for my art he said that my art was too rural, not classical or elevated enough. When we meet, he was wearing a black coat with hair sleek back. and an old tote bag written on his handwriting GEMINGdeYITIAN – “a revolutionary day”, and next to it was written smile in English but spelled “smail”. I found it to be very interesting. Just like he gave this group name “Smart” it is a play on words, in Chinese its actually SHA-MA-TE, where sha means to kill, and ma is a horse. It‘s an aggressive name, we can say truer to the punk influence. All this different slogans and styles coming from unrelated cultures mixed together in one place with a background of rural Chinese village, made the phenomena of smart people more and more interesting. Talking about the background, I should mention that SHIPAI village is one of the villages that have a lot of international factories and houses a lot of migrant workers, its’ interesting that each village hosts people from one province. SHIPAI had exactly this combination of people from YUNAN and GUIEZHOU. So, I had a pleasant surprise when I started recognizing familiar strong accent of my hometown in YUNAN coming from the mouth of people that were washing my hear. And just down the street form hair salon I saw a lot of human resource agency that are managing and hiring migrant workers, I was able to join a WeChat group where they’re looking for people and paying daily, a hour wage of 13 to 17 RMB.
The process of creating my “smart” hairdo was a long one. The hairstylist asked me what kind of style I want, and after explaining I’m not really understand in the details, he explained that there are three different groups. One would be half and half, part of the hair is teased up and put in the back and part is pushed to the front, in second one all the hair is pushed to the front, and the 3rd one would be open in the back, making your hair resemble an open peacock tail, but in the end, he chose for me, seeing that for him I had a face suited for hair pushed to the front. When he was finished, after much hairspray and teasing of the hair, I looked so cool, and cute at the same time, my face was small framed with this big, luscious hair. It reminded me of the early 2000s cartoon hair that you could see in the pictures on different QQ platforms, which brings me to one more interesting fact, Tencent, the company that created QQ is also located in Shenzhen forming a perfect connection as well as completing the style characterizing Chinse internet. For example, there is an online game ‘QQ dancing ‘and ‘Racing car ‘that has different teams or families you can belong too, like “smart people” family, or Buried Love, Cruel Snow family, that are representing real groups of people. According to Luo Fuxing there is now more than 500 different QQ groups where smart people gather online, and each group has around 2 to 5 hundred members. I found it fascinating how Lou Fuxing was able to create this kind of coherent community with strict rules and assert himself as a leader. For example, not everyone can become a member of those QQ group, there are rules on how to get accepted, you have to have interesting QQ shows, creative looks, and notable online presents in other to be allowed to join, once you are in the group you have to follow a specific rule on how to promote yourself and other people.
We found ourselves hurrying to park where the smart people gather after our hair was done. They are very free with their time, and do whatever they feel like. Even the godfather Luo Fuxing himself doesn’t have any authority over what they do or how they spend their time. I was prepared to be greeted with at least shyness, knowing them to be closed, sensitive or distrusting to new people, but since I have already dressed like them, and had a hairstyle like them, I was immediately accepted as one of them, suddenly I was a “Smart people.”
I had never imagined it would be that easy, not only have they accepted me but I also had a feeling that I was one of the smart’s. People felt free to come to me sad say hi, asking me to sing and dance with them, and even if I couldn’t match their elaborate dance moves, I feel I was matching them in spirit. They were dancing with no music, and when I ask why we don’t play music they said it’s just easy to add music in post editing. This gathering, like all, will be recorded on a phone and people will overlay it with music and post it online, on a newer video platform like Kuai and Tik Tok, where a lot of people meet and unite now.
All the Smart kids I meet there were very happy and excited about everything, it was easy to hang out with them, we were dancing and walking around, taking photos with people passing by. The only things we were doing was posing for pictures and videos or preforming some small scenes but not paying attention to language or the posture, we would walk to the camera, do a simple pose and walk back. We would do that over and over again, changing locations in the park. After some time, it became tired but during that process I realized that SHIPAI village is a very culturally diverse place. I was able to spot a lot of different ethnic groups, most of all MIAO people, and one of the boys in our group told me he’s also belongs to a MIAO ethic group. we tried taking pictures with them, but they were very shy would mostly refusing us, especially boys. It occurs to me that smart people and people of MIAO ethnic have a lot of similarities. MIAO people have beautiful, elaborate traditional garb, that they wear especially on Sunday when they meet and have fun together. Similarly, smart people are encouraged to wear this over the top, magnificent creations and to meet up on the weekends to have fun together. Also, smart people were once spread out all across China but know they remain in arias that are poor and isolated, and villages that are developing and growing seem to birth different kind of unique culture, while smart people are going extinct.
We meet with the Luo Fuxing again, he suddenly appeared in the park. He changed his hairstyle in mean time, hangout with us for a little, and then again suddenly despaired.
He was using a lot of language that is usually used in contemporary art circles, he was talking about how he’s moving installation and doing institutional defense of art, so I felt he was influenced by LI YIFAN a lot. The conversation got even trickier when I realized that he considers himself a contemporary artis and director, making him different from other smart people and therefore maybe not as happy as before.
Gathering my impression of the park I thought that this village is nothing like I imagine it. I had a strange feeling that I was witnessing a utopia of a sorts. Yes. This are mostly migrant workers with a lot of serious problems and obstacles in their lives. But at that moment, at the park they very truly happy together forgetting all that ails them, a vision of utopia I have in my mind. In front of the park there is well equipped and beautifully decorated internet café with comfortable chairs where you can play games. I guess this is one of the only luxuries they can afford and indulge in; Most of the smaller factories don’t mind the esthetics of smart people because they’re only temporary workers and they start working very young, so the rules are not so strict; The problems do seep into this beautiful society, sometimes they lose their lovers to a different popular subculture, then they say:” They stole her from me” and then drink a bit too much wine. They try to find girlfriends that don’t belong to smart people by boosting how much they can drink. All of this, of course doesn’t come close to the problems they will be facing in the future, they can’t stay and work there forever, and the money they are earning is not comparable to the money people earn in more developing regions in China. When I asked for their plans, they were all exited to go home for spring festival, sure that they can unite one again when the holiday is over, but I’m afraid they will soon face the harsh reality. There are fewer smart people, the factories are closing, and the economy is not as it used to be, soon there won’t be enough jobs for migrant workers. Once in their hometown, some of them will get married, have children and become just ordinary people, aware that they are left at the bottom of socioeconomical ladder in China. In that moment thou, living for the moment, we were all happy, celebrating just being together.
I remember this one moment. When we were walking next to an artificial hill in the park, one young boy, very athletic and agile, jumped high up to the top that was not meant to be access by the visitors, he spared his costume like, badly made, angel wings and yelled to the wind: “I am the KING” This moment was just like a movie scene, he was so passionate, so young, so happy and everyone was laughing at him, even when he was trying some dance movie high up in a dangerous place. Isn’t that just the simile for life.
After the park I had to go, I didn’t have time to go roller skating with them, I said goodbye to everybody. Luo Fuxing texted me that he went back to the park and that it’s such a shame he missed us. I’m guessing he’s how smart people will grow up. Complicated, conflicted, calculating, but also sensitive and cute in their own way.
I got back to Dongguan, meet with Li Jinghu and had dinner together, we talked about this experience, and I noticed that everyone was looking at me, of course I was still wearing smart people hairdo, and even though I couldn’t see it for myself I was a different person for everybody else. People were asking for a picture, some of them wanted their daughters to have a hair like that, some were talking pictures secretly and some would just stare with a strange look on their faces. I felt happy, like I could do anything, all my fears were melting away. I was special, different, I think I could understand how smart people really feel in the world, they are trying to be different, special and noticed even if they have never been noticed before by this rough, tough world we, and especially they, are living in. And that was a real revolutionary day, one day worth 10 years. A special one day (which is also an abortion advertisement in China)
When I got back to Beijing, I kept in touch, eighter by WeChat or by KUAI (I got a lot of Smart friends). That how I found out that a couple of them got into a car accident are gone, and one boy, an excellent dancer hurt himself while dancing, and is still making videos recovering in hospital dancing on one leg. One guy, called LANGE（wolf guy）, is trying to ask me out, making a lot of interesting edited videos, but also drinking too much, and posting a lot of pictures of himself bleeding. Everyone is dealing with their own problems, but they are so approachable, easy going, easy to understand, and so much inside their own world that I find myself incredibly attracted to them.
I meet Luo Fuxing one more time in Beijing, we went to have hot pot together, and as I though, he doesn’t consider himself as a part of the group any more, he knows the outside world, the consider himself an artis and the only reason he’s still holding to his identity is the fact that he can’t make enough money by himself. There is still something he has to figure out for himself.
I asked myself can we keep this culture alive, Should I even be trying to change it or adapt it, and since is not a traditional culture but a new one, should we let it go and see how it will develop naturally. These questions of only grow as I find myself getting closer with different members of the group, find myself involved with divergent group activities and finally making art with them. Can it be harmful for them to introduce them to the world that might not give them all they think they will get if they step inside.
