Amid Smog Wave, an Artist Molds a Potent Symbol of Beijing’s Pollution
Photo
The artist “Brother Nut”
vacuuming the dust near the Beijing National Stadium on Nov. 15, Day 87
of his project to turn the city’s pollution into a tangible brick.Credit
Dong Dalu/CFP
Beijing
has been swamped for days in a beige-gray miasma of smog, bringing
coughs and rasping, hospitals crowded from respiratory ailments, a
midday sky so dim that it could pass for evening, and head-shaking
disgust from residents who had hoped the city was over the worst of its
chronic pollution.
But
“Brother Nut,” a performance artist, has something solid to show from
the acrid soup in the air: a brick of condensed pollution.
For
100 days, Brother Nut dragged a roaring, industrial-strength vacuum
cleaner around the Chinese capital’s landmarks, sucking up dust from the
atmosphere. He has mixed the accumulated gray gunk with red clay to
create a small but potent symbol of the city’s air problems.
Photo
Brother Nut, in a brick
factory in Tangshan, Hebei Province, with his unfinished brick of dust
and red clay. “In smog like this,” he said, “There’s no escaping.”Credit
Dong Dalu/CFP
“Dust
represents the side effects of humankind’s development, including smog
and building-site dust,” he explained in an interview on Tuesday. “When I
first arrived in Beijing, I wore a hygienic mask for a few days, but
later I stopped. In smog like this, there’s no escaping.”
Reports
in the Chinese news media about his “Project Dust” have coincided with
the worst smog in more than a year across northern China, and Brother
Nut — Jianguo Xiongdi in Mandarin Chinese, as he insists on calling
himself — has catapulted to instant fame in this city, where people talk
about ups and downs in PM2.5 air pollution with the same familiarity
that the English reputedly discuss rainfall.
“Nearly
everyone in Beijing would have a brick in their stomachs. Older people,
maybe five,” said one of over 4,000 often-rueful comments on an online photo gallery of Brother Nut’s project.
“If
all of the dust in Beijing was collected together, it would be enough
to build the world’s biggest environmental protection bureau,” said
another.
The wave of smog across northern China arrived shortly before the start on Monday of negotiations in Paris, where governments hope to settle on a new agreement to reduce the greenhouse-gas pollution causing global warming.
Much of that smog originates from the same coal-fire boilers, vehicle
exhausts and industrial plants that pump out carbon dioxide, the main
greenhouse gas.
Photo
Brother Nut collecting polluted Beijing air near the Wangjing SOHO office and retail complex.Credit
Jianguo Xiongdi
But
Brother Nut,34, smirked at suggestions that he might become a spokesman
for efforts to clean up the environment. His intention was
philosophical, he said.
“What
I’ve done is like Sisyphus rolling his giant stone,” he said. “There’s
no use, but it can make more people think about this issue. It’s a
spiritual thing.”
Even
without Brother Nut’s inspiration, many people in Beijing and other
smog-afflicted cities have been upset about the latest inundation.
The
Chinese government has promised to clean up the pollution, especially
PM2.5, the tiny particles that can cause respiratory illness and other
health problems. For much of this year, the air across Beijing and other
cities has been cleaner, perhaps also partly thanks to a slowdown in
industrial production.
But
the new onslaught of smog has brought complaints from residents that
local governments in Beijing and other cities were complacent and ill
prepared for the pollution buildup in static winter air. The capital
issued an “orange alert” — the second-highest pollution warning — for
the first time since February 2014.
Brother Nut said he was no expert on PM2.5 pollution or its ill effects.
But
feeling inspired to do something about the air quality, he bought a
vacuum cleaner with rechargeable batteries and starting roaming the city
with it in July.
He
dragged the machine close to Tiananmen Square, the National Center for
the Performing Arts, the China Central Television tower and other
landmarks. In this usually security-sensitive city, the police were
sometimes curious, but he was not harassed, he said.
Photo
Brother Nut at Tiananmen Square. He said that many in Beijing mistook him for a high-tech street sweeper.Credit
Jianguo Xiongdi
Some onlookers failed to fathom his artistic purpose and mistook him for a high-tech street sweeper, he said.
“Some
people thought, ‘Wow, Beijing’s really awesome,’” he said. “‘Now
they’ve got air cleaners like this.’ They asked me how much money I
made. Some thought I was selling vacuum cleaners.”
He also encountered a real street sweeper, he said, and “he asked me to vacuum a bit, and I did.”
