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Started construction on the farm a while ago with a team of chinese workers. I had everything ready in detail and printed out some 3D images so everybody would have a clear idea how the final solution would look like. With the 3D drawings and all measurements we also set out to complete an order at metal shop and building equipment hardware stores.
Unfortunately the well-bargained second hand stuff that arrived a couple of hours later had different options, which made me forget all my hard hours of ArchiCad wrestling. We just went along with what was available, that means materials, ideas, possibilities and.... great tricks. In just 4 days the execution grounds were completely finished, including smooth concrete floor and shiny polished cement interior walls. Not to forget my foolproof metalwelding hoisting installment. What it was all for is of course confidential, and you wouldn't want to see it anyway. The only thing I can disclose is that I had a fantastic meal of spicy pig stomach, specially made for me by the staff at the village restaurant.
As to take a break from the atrocities, we decided upon an excursion to The Great Wall. Hired one of our drivers to bring us up to Badaling, the most well-known spot. That of course made it one of the most crowded and touristically exploited places of all China. Already on the parking lot every corner is cramped with stalls selling t-shirts 'I Climbed the Great Wall', fake fur hats, books, overrated hiking gear and every other item that potentially would encourage visitors to spare a dime.
The Great Wall at Badaling is mostly rebuilt from the ground up on the ancient foundations in 1957 when it became the first site open for tourists. There is only a 3km stretch that you can walk upon, and we took the toughest north side with very steep climbings but a fantastic view with the Wall swirling up and down the hills in the distance.
Also hard to overcome are the numerous vendors that virtually cover the wall. You'll either be harassed to buy an 'I Climbed the Great Wall' t-shirt (if you didn't get one already), a stone tablet with your name carved and the date on which you climbed the Wall, a tourist book in many languages but dutch about the Wall, old coins,.... you name it, you can get it on The Great Wall. But then of course I have to admit that it's kinda funny to bargain with a vendor, not for a t-shirt because it's too damn cold at this time of year, but for the coat she was wearing but didn't want to sell, with a broad smile. At least there's honour among vendors.
Apart from the Wall itself there's a Museum of the Great Wall, where you can see a lot of pictures from various Wall sections. Some of them look really good, and probably worthwile to hike along if you have more time to spend and can find your way around. There's also original bricks from the Wall, and a nice setup with puppets depicting how battles on and around the Wall were fought.
Around noon we found out that nothing beats the village restaurant when it comes to good food!
Next on the scouting trip were the Ming Tombs. Scattered in the foothills are the graves of thirteen emperors, enclosed by beautiful wooded landscapes. We first headed for Ding Ling, tomb to Emperor Wanli. Albeit an impressing building and gardens around, the tomb itself is a drab underground corridor with a series of ox-blood coloured coffins in the deepest underground musty vault.
Much more impressing, and less crowded, was Chang Ling. Still unexcavated, but well worth just for the Hall of Eminent Flowers (remember that 'your young life is like a flower') which has enormous columns made from individual tree trunks. Never imagined it was possible to find that many straight perfect trees of this size. Also noteworthy are the huge walls which are lined with trees growing from between the bricks.
Unfortunately no 'climing' here ;)
Again days later another hotspot was on target: Tien'Anmen Square and the Forbidden City. Although it doesn't look like it, Tien'Anmen is the world's largest public square. It is lined with the Great Hall of the People and the Museums of History and the Revolution. The square and the streets around are full with uniformed soldiers and policemen. Not a lot is allowed, supposedly bicycles aren't even allowed on the square itself.
So we settled for the Imperial Palace aka 'Forbidden City'. Forbidden because during the reign of the Ming and Qing dynasties, the common Chinese were forbidden to even approach the walls. Quite different from today, when tens of thousands Chinese flock to see the wealth, harmonious design and grandeur in an enormous scale. You can probably spend a whole day, if not more on wandering through the vast Forbidden City. Just the distance between one building and another takes a brisk walk and there's many corridors, side-buildings, halls and smaller palaces to visit. Apart from the breathtaking interiors and vast scale, the buildings are painstakingly being restored with fine coloured painting.
After all that wealth and symbolism, I ached for some other kind of entertainment, so I headed for the Natural History Museum. OK, I'll admit I have a weakness for Natural History and Anatomy museums. At first the Beijing museum didn't top by far like the one in Shanghai, but much was levelled even with a small separate building, a bit humbly nested next to the entrance gate. The door was open, but right away some attendant came running to explain that the display was closed for visitors. Well, sometimes it helpes being a clumsy tourist who doesn't speak any chinese, so I happily pointed out that I didn't mind the mess and set forth to get baffled by the amazing collection.
The showroom is barely larger than the main dining room of my village restaurant, and a large part is taken up by some kind of artificial island with a huge plastic tree in the middle. The walls are lined with an array of hardly identifiable objects and weird posters, ranging from soft porno subjects to colourful illustrations of veneral diseases and burn victims to a grotesque of an immensely fat western woman. In plastic containers there are a few cut up human anatomy parts, with a slight preference for genital areas in different stadiums of dissection. But also the opened chest of a man whose head is also half cut, is floating about halfway in a tank of formoldehyde that's in great need of a refill. Somewhere in the middle next to a number of jerrycans is a long container containing a skinned human leg, must gone somewhat astray from doing all the walking in Beijing.
But by far the best items are two complete human figures in large tanks. One is completely skinned except for the genitals and fingertips, the toes it was hard to tell because he was wearing socks. The other one is completely skinned, except for one leg. Apart from that the outside of the chest is removed to expose heart and lungs. The kind of transparant cloth that covers the head unmistakenly shows a contorted face with a wide open mouth.
Was it because of all this extreme nakedness, or by the frosty temperatures on The Great Wall, or perhaps just caused by the broken window of our local driver, I don't know. But anyway, I'm stuck with a hell of a cold, so bear with me for now....
Ah, forgot to say that I sometimes can't resist to peek at what's happening in Belgium through some Belgian newspapers' websites. There I came across an article about the interest of the art market for contemporary art. Main focus was Luc Tuymans' 1994 painting 'Premonition', based on his genuine interest in John Casey (sic), the serial killer who dressed up as a clown and also took up painting while in jail. Maybe his true interest was based on the piece 'Killer Clown' I made in 1991, sporting a real painting that I bought from Gacy while I was corresponding with him from 1987 till 1990. I showed this piece in Ruimte Morguen, an Antwerp art gallery where both me and Tuymans exhibited at that time....
Read my correspondence with John Wayne Gacy here.
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