ABSTRACT
Models of desired behaviour have functioned as forceful mechanisms to inculcate behavioral traits among the Chinese people. In pre-modern China, the state engaged in an early form of propaganda which was based on the idea of the ‘malleability of man’. Confucianism was made the ideology of the State during the first century of the rule of the Han dynasty. Education played a major role in the dynamics of belief control. The pre-existing visual tradition, originally geared to the demands of literate audiences, was based on a number of influences, both domestic and foreign. The emergence of popular illustrated journals was instrumental in the creation of a mass culture. Historical circumstances in the late 1930s greatly influenced the birth of a new, agitational style in the visual arts. In the early 1950s, the popularizing function of the arts was again stressed over their ability to raise cultural awareness.
