UP CLOSE
LI RAN
“The features of the human skeleton vary from person to person while the skeletal structure reveals similar objective patterns,” Li Ran narrates at the beginning of (2017–19), as a black-and-white photograph of a face painted to resemble a skull fades into view, swiftly joined by its mirror image in the video’s second channel. In the lilting voice-over of midcentury film dubbers, Li relates the teachings of Soviet dramaturge V. V. Terevtzov, who in 1958 arrived at the Shanghai Theatre Academy as a makeup coach. Reeling through archival photographs of costumed actors, Li explains Terevtzov’s precept of “thinking gestures at the superficial refashioning of heroes and villains across ideological discourses. Eventually, we learn, the Sino-Soviet split sends Terevtzov packing and heralds a slew of Chinese espionage films in the 1960s featuring actors in whiteface as the enemy.
