I met Ou Ning for the first time at the Rehearsal Art Book Fair last September in New York. Ou Ning visited my table, and I introduced my publications to him. He listened attentively amid the noisy surroundings and nodded several times when I explained the meanings of several corals from Coral Dictionary, which made me feel encouraged. On the second day, I visited Ou Ning’s table when the fair had just opened and was still quiet. Before I picked up any of his books, I was already impressed by the general tone of the table: solid and steady, which must come from years of hard, meticulous work. Immediately, I was also made aware of my ignorance: I think of myself as an art-publishing insider who has seen too many books, but here was a whole table of experimental publications in Mandarin that I had neither seen nor heard of. Regrettably, I had to return to my own table that day and didn’t read anything closely. In November, when my fellow librarian Alvin proposed that we should make another acquisition for Asymmetry, I immediately thought of Ou Ning’s work. I wrote an email to introduce our experimentation that we call 'Librarians in Residence', and Ou Ning responded:

Around 2014, I became aware of the faith in 'reading books' held by China’s ordinary working class people, so I involved a bookstore in my rural reconstruction project, which could attract villagers better than art events, because they share the belief that through reading books one can change one’s fate. Because of the unique context of China, we had to set up the bookstore in order to operate as a legitimate entity, while in fact it functioned as a library. When I was teaching in Columbia in 2016, I was very impressed by the academic services offered by the university’s libraries, especially the collection of rare books and manuscripts. When I was researching the utopian communities of North America, I visited the Workingmen Institute in Indiana, which was America’s earliest free study center for workers, and later influenced the public library system of America. In 2017 I founded the Suochengli Neighborhood Library in Yantai, and I invited Dong Gong to design the architecture, and selected books myself with a focus on the local history. Since I relocated to New York last year, I have often used the Forest Hills public library, which has deepened my understanding of how it functions as a community center. As a writer and a publisher, I realized that a library is not only where the results of our work can be collected, but the best spatial medium for placemaking. (Translated from Mandarin by Yuchen.)

Two weeks later, I visited Ou Ning in Forest Hills on a rainy afternoon. It was not far from where I live. A pile of books was prepared for me on a big desk facing the window. However, the first book Ou Ning told me about was not to hand. When he was in high school, he wrote poems and printed them using a mimeograph. These self-published chapbooks circulated underground, to the point that when he 'drifted' across the country by train, he was hosted by poetry readers. This was the end of the ‘80s. In 1989, Cui Jian launched his first album, Nothing to My Name; in 1992, Deng Xiaoping conducted the Southern Tour; in 1993, Ou Ning graduated from Shenzhen University; and in the same year the Moyan Sanjie, or 'Three Prominent Ones of Magic Stone Records', all launched their albums. Among these, Zhang Chu’s lyrics in particular made Ou Ning realize that rock and roll is precisely poetry plus melody and beat and can circulate more powerfully. In 1994, Ou Ning started a music organization, New Masses, through which he organized rock concerts in southern China, and made free publications for the concert audiences. One issue of the New Masses was carried to Lanzhou by chance, and fell into the hands of Yan Jun, who at the time was still a journalist. This led to many collaborations, including the famous and now rare book, New Sound of Beijing. In 1999, Ou Ning founded the independent film and video organization, U-thèque, based in Shenzhen and Guangzhou, which ran a membership model, and hosted screenings and conversations with filmmakers. Alongside the weekly screening events there was also a journal, u-fax – an unbound publication that encouraged members to make copies and circulate them further.

From poetry, rock and roll and sound art to film, publishing seems to be the hidden yet consistent thread in Ou Ning’s promiscuous practice. Even though they were made as companions to happenings, these publications have woven patches of social fabric through their flexible, organic, and lively circulation. For various reasons, the lifespan of these publications are finite, yet the range they’ve traveled and the times they’ve been handed on are incalculable, as are the intellectual and emotional resonances they’ve caused. At this point in our conversation, I felt I was catching up on a lesson I had missed. I encountered the concept of artists’ books when I was in graduate school in Chicago, and from 2013 to 2020 I worked for Printed Matter in New York, and all the while I’ve been working in the realm of self-publishing. Yet I know nearly nothing about the artistic practice of publishing in the Mandarin world, and I had to invoke the American punk zines of the ‘70s as a reference point to understand Ou Ning’s New Masses. And mysteriously, scenes of my father enjoying cultural products surfaced in my memory: when I was in elementary school, I once came home to him blasting Pink Floyd with his newly purchased sound system. When I was in high school, the bookshelf at home was stuffed with DVDs that my father had brought back from Beijing. That was the ‘90s. Even though I was only a child/teenager of an inland city, I benefited indirectly from the cultural atmosphere of the time. With a sense of grief, I also remembered what Beijing was like when I was in college (2007-2010), and the excitement, curiocity, openness, and confidence in the air. The long, continuous thread of Ou Ning’s practice made me see clearly the gaps and ruptures in my experience.

Like many people, initially I learned about Ou Ning because of Bishan Commune, and it is my great honor to acquire a copy of Bishan Commune – How to Start Your Own Utopia, Bishan Harvestival, and a 'passport' issued on the occasion of Yixian International Photo Festival. Bishan Commune – How to Start Your Own Utopia is a reproduction of a notebook that included Ou Ning’s research notes on micronations and practical utopias, his examination on his own historical fascination with the idea of communitarianism and the practice of placemaking, as well as his grand plan for Bishan (emblem, flag, uniform, architecture) that later became true.

Odyssey: Architecture and Literature connects two stars of the constellation that is Ou Ning’s practice. As the curator of the Urbanism\Architecture Bi-City Biennale (UABB) of Shenzhen and Hong Kong, Ou Ning invited 9 novelists to create 9 fictional stories based on 9 actual architectural sites in different parts of China. Besides the stories, this book also includes many architectural sketches, rendering, and vector illustrations. Designed by Xiaoma + Chengzi, this book bridges architecture and literature through the unique spatiality of the book form – where one can wander or linger.

Edited by Ou Ning, Chutzpah is a bimonthly literary journal launched in 2011, and had 15 issues before it came to an end in 2014. We have the pleasure of acquiring 5 issues. In Chutzpah, the spatiality of architectural design is translated into the temporality of content editing: every issue has an 'entrance' and an 'exit', both are designated pages for poetry. The main body of the journal is divided into 'special space' and 'regular space', while the English companion within the journal is called 'parasite'. I haven’t been able to put them down since I brought them home a few days ago, and it saddens me slightly that I will have to ship them to London soon. In 'Going Home with Verdure Spring' included in issue 06 The Revolutions, Zhong Yong-feng recollected his experience in the Meinong Anti-dam Movement. With precise and unadorned language, his writing struck me as both critical and full of compassion, which reminded me of the preciousness of a rudimentary quality that we call kindness. And while reading Ha Jin’s short stories Shame and A Pension Plan in issue 05 The Diaspora, which depict lives of Chinese immigrants in New York, I recognized my loneliness. As if it is only through literature that one can have a peek of others’ struggle and interiority and feel connected. It is incredible that 10 years after their publishing, they still offered me timely nourishment and solace.

I will start packing once I’m done writing this text, and the package will contain 17 books. Besides what I have mentioned above, there are many more interesting, special, and unclassifiable publications. I hope they will continue to encounter new readers in Asymmetry, and from each encounter new meanings will be generated. Lastly, I’d like to express my gratitude to Ou Ning, my fellow librarian Alvin Li, and Asymmetry, for starting my new year with joyful readings.

Chang Yuchen
January 2024, Queens, New York