Middle School

1999

Middle School, 1999. Hai Bo (Chinese, b. 1962). Gelatin silver print; paper: 40.6 x 58.4 cm (16 x 23 in.). The Cleveland Museum of Art, Gift of Richard Born 2019.306.a Hai Bo acknowledges the changes wrought by time and politics when he has his family and friends pose in the same arrangement as group portraits taken of them 3 decades earlier during the communist era, which stressed a collective identity. Juxtaposed as diptychs with the historic images, the 1990s portraits reveal not just the aging of the sitters, but also their relative prosperity and freedom to express their individuality. What we call the Mao suit was first advocated in the 1910s by Dr. Sun Yat-Sen, who wanted to create a national dress for China.