My Shanghai Girls

I recognized a familiar face when entering my local library recently. It wasn't a neighbor or business colleague. Nor was it someone from a local store or doctor's office. The face was more distinctive than any of those possibilities. It was the beautifully painted face of a Chinese woman on the cover of Lisa See's new novel, Shanghai Girls. The book was positioned squarely in the center of the library's New York Times Best Seller List display.

Shanghai Girls is a well-crafted historical novel that tells the story through Pearl Chin about her and her sister, May. They are a very attractive duo growing up in Shanghai in the 1930s. In their late teens, they were from a successful middle class family in a city that was frequently referred to as the Paris of the East. Indeed, during that period Shanghai was probably the most metropolitan and sophisticated city in Asia.

The Chin sisters were daughters of a prospering rickshaw taxi company. Although they didn't need to work, both were models for a leading local commercial artist who created beautiful "calendar posters" that served as a form for the advertising of Western products sold in China.

It was in that context that I knew these Shanghai girls. While I never met Pearl or May, I knew of their art form, Chinese Calendar Posters and the women portrayed in them. Not only was I aware of their art form, but I had become a collector. The library display of the book jacket was the first time I had come across any Western reference or recognition that these interesting pieces of art existed.

My First Introduction

I first became familiar with Chinese Calendar Posters when I worked in Beijing in the mid-90s. While waiting for a colleague at the Beijing Hilton Hotel bar, I discovered a dramatic and engaging collection of these posters displayed across an entire wall of the room.

My eye focused on how the artists created "creamy" images of happy, prosperous women dressed in what appeared to be Westernized Chinese clothes of the 1920s and 1930s. These images seemed so out of context to me as I had no visual frame of reference for this period. What I saw was in sharp contrast to the popular blue and grey Mao suits that I often saw on the streets throughout Beijing. Clothing styles were changing as the entire country was changing, but still, high fashion and colorful outfits and well-coiffed hair were out of the realm of my daily visual experience.

Over the following months I visited many antique and flea markets and began buying these calendar posters. They appealed to my interest in historical advertising and a sense of nostalgia for that era. While not easy to find, every now and then one would show up over the next two years.

A New Advertising Medium

Most of the Calendar Posters had a consistent format that included a very young, attractive Chinese woman wearing a very fashionable floral qipao dress, a traditional Chinese garment that had been transformed in the early 20th Century. The women were presented as the central and dominant image and were usually placed in a typical Chinese scene in a home or in some outdoor activity.

While the traditional calendar posters were converted to advertising material, the commercial products were secondary in the presentation. This was a sharp reversal of Western advertising where the product was usually presented as the focal point.

A wide range of companies used these posters to create product awareness and interest. Tobacco products were the most popular in the medium, but canned milk, flashlight batteries, insurance policies and sewing materials were also typical products showcased in the margins of the posters.

Although these posters are commonly referred to as Calendar Posters, this reference was more directed to the art form as not all posters included a calendar. Those that did include a calendar had a 12-month lunar calendar placed in a secondary border position on the left and right margins or at the bottom.

Another typical motif was the use of a classical Art Deco border which added period relevance and beauty to the overall presentation.

History of the Calendar Posters

Up until the outbreak of WWII, Chinese Calendar Posters were not only an effective advertising medium, but also a highly prized form of art. These posters were descendants of a Chinese art wood cut form common in the Song Dynasty (960-1279). It was not until some 600 years later in the Qing Dynasty (1644-1911) that calendars included pictures of traditional characters associated with happiness, good luck and fortune. When lithographic printing was introduced into China after the 2nd Opium War (1856-1860) the art form was adapted and transferred to mass printed material. As the 19th century drew to a close, the Chinese Calendar Posters evolved into an advertising medium similar to posters appearing in the United States and Europe.

The poster art form was now being put to work as a cog in the emerging Industrial Revolution. Products were being manufactured in mass and advertising was needed to help sell them to an emerging middle class. People needed to be shown how these products fit into their lives, and they needed to be shown happy and fulfilled customers.

Evolution of Portraying Women in China

The art form began to evolve both in its aesthetic presentation as well as in the manner in which how women were shown. The artist's layouts and perspectives began to change from the traditional Chinese painting style of a flat color wash method to one that reflected Western influence. This was seen with the new use of color, layout and realism that were combined to create a new contemporary vision. Some observers at that time viewed these new images as "bold, uninhibited and realistic".

The portrayal of women also reflected a new self-identity. The Chinese Calendar Posters primarily showcased women exclusively (and occasionally with their children). But women were now being elevated as elegant figures with new hairstyles and wearing very fashionable clothes. They were no longer presented and positioned in a secondary or subservient role.

The clothing initially reflected the traditional Chinese garments in the earliest posters, but over subsequent decades women's clothing became westernized. The best example is of this is how the traditional qipao dress was shown. The qipao was commonly a loose-fitting garment that went to the floor and had long sleeves.

As 20th Century modernity and the status of women began to evolve, so did the clothing reflected in the Calendar Posters. Around the eclipse of the Qing Dynasty in 1911, the posters of that decade reflected changes in the qipaos. Their qipao leg and arm lengths were shortened, now showing the mid-calf and sleeves above the forearm. In the 1920s, they were shortened again and women's waistlines began to appear as the garments were closer fitting. In the 1930's, necklines were lowered so that bosoms became more apparent.

In addition to the clothing evolution toward a more modern and liberating era, the model's poses began to appear more self-confident. To complement these features, artists created special techniques to make the most of lithographic printing. Leading artists like Zheng Mantuo (1888-1961) and Hang Zhiying (1899-1947) beautifully designed the faces of the models by using a layer of carbon powder that was then carefully rubbed on the image which rendered a sensual milky image of the model's facial features.

All of these poster changes reflected a search for a new and more modern and Western-accepting identity but with Chinese characteristics.

Shanghai's Significance

A major influence in these changes was that the posters were most frequently conceived, created and printed in Shanghai (while Hong Kong and Guangzhou served as secondary sources of this material). Shanghai became the de facto center as Western culture had been well-ensconced there since the Opium Wars in the mid-1800s. The French, British and German communities were protected and thriving commercial and social centers of influence living in what was referred to as the Concession neighborhoods of Shanghai.

The Concession life that reached its zenith in the late 1930s fostered the climate that encouraged Pearl and May Chin to become Calendar Posters models. They saw the good life around them and wanted to be a part of it.

End of an Era

Over several centuries in China, Calendar Posters played an important role in extolling good luck and good fortune to the recipient. But that good fortune was about to come to a harsh ending as Shanghai was militarily taken by Japan at the beginning of the WWII. Luxuries and the upwardly mobile lifestyle were no longer able to flourish.

Even after the defeat of Japan, life in Shanghai and throughout all of China reflected a social climate change where consumption of Western-style products was very much out of favor and out of place.

Mao Tse Tung's vision allowed no room for this lifestyle or products. Whatever consumerism existed before WWII, it was essentially extinguished for close to forty years. Along with this change, the Calendar Posters also disappeared. Due to the Cultural Revolution that occurred from 1966 to 1976, most of these beautiful posters were destroyed by the out-of-control Red Guard.

But like the spirit of the Chin sisters, Pearl and May, some of these posters survived episodes of civil, military, social and political upheaval. Those that survived, like the sisters envisioned by Lisa See, and the Calendar Posters in my collection, still have a luster and charm glowing from their images. Pearl and May, and my Shanghai girls, still radiate hope and optimism - the right gesture for the approaching Lunar New Year.

Michael Peroff has spent his entire career in the advertising business. He is currently an owner and partner in a digital advertising agency located in New York City and previously worked in several global advertising agencies. In addition to his agency experience, he co-founded and served as the CEO of a media company based in Beijing, China.