For anyone interested in an aesthetic and ideological history of the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution, there is no better primary source than the thousands of differently-designed badges of Chairman Mao Zedong.
I buy a bunch every time I go to China, adding them to the ones I started wearing as a teenager in the late 1960s.
Where I can, I provide a brief description of the front image of the badge, and a translation of the inscription on the rear, which often identifies the event commemorated by the badge and/or the issuing authority.
If you got to Flickr through the "Mike's Mao Badges" link opposite, you'll now see one hundred badges of Chairman Mao.
The information I've provided on each is similar in format to that for badge no. 100 (above):
Aluminium
Diam: 40mm
Red, gold
Front: Mao Zedong against red background, golden waves below
Rear: 国庆 inside red lantern
欢庆国庆十九周年 1968.10.1 (Huanqing Guoqing shijiu zhounian – Celebrate the 19th Anniversary of National Day 1st October 1968)
Preserve the people's history!
For a revolutionary aesthetics!
1 comment:
Mike
I have writen a Poem called Mao and the Great Liar Jung Chang it is on seek-the-truth-serve-the-people.blogspot.com
Take a look I hope you like it !
Haisanlu
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