Every year, when the spring is approaching, millions of art students would surge into various art academies to take exams. Chen Huimin is one of the huge army called art students.
Every weekend, the girl with neat bangs, thick glasses and a school uniform, carries her drawing board, with music plugged into her ears, to a drawing workshop hosted by an experienced art teacher.
Art examinations are a talent selection method which is different from the Gaokao. Every year, various academies would hold art exams in advance. If the students who specialise in singing, dancing, drawing, broadcasting, etc. pass the exams, they will earn certificates of qualification. These students will be enrolled into universities with lower grades than common students who have to go through the pain of Gaokao exams.
For them, the certificate means an express ticket to get the preferential regulations of the Gaokao system. Thus, a growing number of students try to take art exams every year just to avoid the pressure of the Gaokao. Further, there is no sign of this trend disappearing any time soon.
Once in China, applying to college is about one thing and one thing only for senior high students, even for their families behind them; Gaokao is short for The National College Entrance Exams. As time goes by, the Gaokao has become symbolic of the hyper-competitive nature of China’s education system. But now, with more and more people are realising the GaoKao is not a single-plank bridge; parents, teachers and students are choosing alternative ways to avoid the pressure, such as applying to overseas universities and taking art exams.
“When I was a little girl, I studied drawing for several years. Unfortunately, I quit it because of study burdens. But now, with strokes of a paintbrush, I can accomplish my dream of becoming a cartoonist,” says Chen Huimin. Sitting in her art teacher’s tiny attic, the girl is sketching a view of traditional Chinese hills. For the second-grade student in senior high school, the art exam is a precious way to fulfill her art dream.
These days, Gong Xingnuo often posts and shares her graduation works on WeChat, a famous Chinese media platform. As a former art student, now she is a graduate student specialising in drawing at Chongqing Normal University. She played a role in a modern drama called the Heart of Jessamine Girl and designed some derivative products such as Jessamine dolls and printed vanities. “I would never regret to have chosen this major because I can do what I dreamed of”, says the girl. “There was even a demand to buy my products, which made me very proud.”
Art exams provide another way for those students who devote themselves to art to be enrolled in the universities. However, art exams provide shortcuts for those students who try to dodge Gaokao pressures as well. Zhu Zheng, a grade one student in senior high, chooses to become an art student this year. “One day, when I was watching television, I saw a piece of news that art exams are easier than the Gaokao, so I made up my mind to study drawing.” Different from Chen, Zhu’s interest is singing, but now he specialises in drawing. “My instructor told me that drawing is the quickest way to be trained. He also said I was not gifted at singing.”
After the Chinese government produced relevant policies of developing quality-oriented education, art exams became more and more popular and people from all levels of society consider it a real practice of quality-oriented education. Besides official promotion, another non-political factor is that children who were born under the One Child Policy are now of college-educated age. Their parents strive after favourable conditions for their children. Some families even set aside a large portion of their savings for art exams.
Chen Huimin does not come from a rich family. Although her parents do not support her choosing the path of art, they saved money for their daughter. Chen Huimin says, “Compared with other students, we art students would spend one to two hundred thousand renminbi on art exams including transportation and exam fees”.
China has seen a rapid development in privately-owned art training centers in recent years, showing the country’s growing demand for such training. There are more than one million art students nationwide in 2013, an almost thirtyfold increase since 2002, according to the Art Education Profession Analysis Report in 2013. However, behind the noticeable trend, some negative influences have emerged from the water.
Almost eleven years ago, there was a famous TV news program named News Probe. One of the programs discussed bribery occurring in the Chinese Conservatory of Music. A teacher and Erhu performer, Song Fei, exposed art examination bribery in this music academy. Ultimately, the programme was banned in China after its premiere. There was no immediate official explanation for it being off-air. However, there was no doubt that the investigative piece pricked the art examinations nerves.
“It seems that all the students should prepare some money to bribe examiners”, said Chen Huimin when asked about the issue. One of her relatives, who always got good marks in drawing, failed the art exam just because she forgot to give the examiners a red envelope, a typical Chinese form of bribes. “The examiners changed her drawing so that she would not receive grades in one of the subjects; pencil sketch”, says Chen Huimin.
Now, art exams bribes are becoming a trend. Zhuo, one of the teachers in the Shanghai Theater Academy, was sentenced to 6 years in prison and was fined ¥30,000 in 2014, according to Labour News based in Shanghai. He blackmailed art students and made money using this form of manipulation. As a civil servant, he used his position to ensure projects which benefit himself, and led to the loss of the academy’s reputation.
Zhou Jing, the classmate of Chen Huimin in the drawing workshop, points out, “not all the art students really like drawing and they just see drawing as a means to an university enrollment”.
Zhu Zheng is such a typical student. He does not like drawing and he chooses art exams just because he always gets poor grades when taking the common exams. Zhu’s dream is to make money and have a good job. If a job or position can pay him a good salary, he will regard it as good job. Some art students lack life targets and job plans. They are aware of the importance of money and are materialistic. They repeated the platitude,
“The economic bases determine the upper architecture”, even though they do not know what is the real meaning of Marxist’s words too much.
Not all the students cherish drawing as their career and some of them see it as a strategy, a means to an end.
When they were asked about the future of life, Zhu Zheng replied, “Who knows? As students, our first task is to get enrolled into university. Life is like a chocolate box, you don’t know the taste until you try them”.
This article was first published in The Nanjinger Magazine, November 2015 Issue. If you would like to read the whole magazine, please follow this link.
