Wang Qingsong studied painting at Sichuan Fine Arts Institute, graduating in 1991 and then moving to Beijing, where he continues to live and work. His practice focuses on photography, which he started using in the 1990s. His large-format color photography deals with Western influence on China as well as China’s rapid modernization, ironically and humorously exploring the sudden changes that Chinese society has undergone, not least consumerism, a demographic shift from the regions to the cities, the emergence of a middle class, and increased contact with the outside world. Featuring many actors and staged with various props, his work frequently employs parody and references to both Chinese and Western traditions of art history. From the early 2000s, Wang began exhibiting outside China, and has held solo shows around the world at such venues as the International Center of Photography Museum (New York, 2011) and San Diego Museum of Art (USA, 2022). He has also appeared in major international exhibitions like the Biennale of Sydney (2010) and Venice Biennale (2013).

This work is a large-format photograph in which Wang himself appears in the center, playing the role of a teacher. Using a pointing stick to indicate something, the teacher is dwarfed by the blackboard behind him that is crammed with Chinese and English words written in chalk. The title, Follow Me, is taken from the name of a popular educational TV show, broadcast in China from 1982 and which not only taught viewers English but also offered them glimpses of Western society. The logos for North American and European corporations like Nike, McDonald’s, and Mercedes-Benz that are drawn on the blackboard as well as the Coca-Cola bottle on the teacher’s desk can be interpreted as comments on the rapid Westernization of Chinese society. Meant to show the eighth in a series of lectures, one slogan on the blackboard particularly catches the eye: “Let China walks [sic] towards the world! Let the world learns [sic] about China!” Created the year after the 2008 Olympics were awarded to Beijing, and at a time when contemporary Chinese art was attracting attention across the world, the work deals satirically and in a pop art style with the breakthroughs the country was making in the international community.