Yue Minjun

signed and dated 2005

Private Collection, New York

Feng Boyi ed., Reproduction Icons: Yue Minjun Works, 2004-2006, China, Hexiangning Art Museum, 2006, p. 92, illustrated in colour

This work is in generally very good condition overall. There is some minor rubbing in the lower right corner edge and some minor soiling along the extreme left and right edges. Otherwise there are no apparent condition problems with this work.
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"My interest in the hat was piqued at the time of the Olympic Games in Athens, when various hats were used to denote the ranking of the medal winners. They were all based around the shaped of an olive. It was a harmless idea, intended to promote the fact of the games being held in Greece, where the whole concept of the games originated. It was also rather amusing. It made me think about the origin of hats, and how the symbolism of "the hat" evolved. Why was it that this particular accessory became the sign of a job, a social position? Or stranger still, how a hat could signify nationality, or an ethnic group. Today most societies don't require people to wear hats. Those we see most commonly are part of a uniform that goes with a job - construction worker, policeman, soldier, nurse. People who choose to wear hats today usually use them to make statements about their personalities, so the hat becomes an extension of the wearer's image. No one chooses a hat lightly: it has to be right. Unless it goes with the job - then you have no choice. So the placing of various hats on the figures in this series of paintings is about highlighting the role of the hat in asserting and reinforcing social differentials, and my sense of the absurdity of the ideas that govern the sociopolitical protocol surrounding hats."