I largely agree with Magnus’s comments, but analysis of the history and development of exhibitions of the terra-cotta warriors may require a bit more nuance (which may be present in Magnus’s 2015 essay, which I haven’t yet read –apologies).
Around the time I viewed the “Son of Heaven: Imperial Arts of China” exhibit (with terra-cotta statues as its centerpiece) in early Spring 1989, my classmates, friends, coworkers (at the Ohio State University library), and professors were enthusiastically following events in Beijing, and equally enthusiastic about the marvelous archeological finds being made in China, then showing in Columbus. As I recall, almost all of these people were in sympathy with and support of the students at Tiananmen. In other words, Westerners, Chinese (both nationals and Chinese-Americans)–most everyone I knew at the time–greatly enjoyed this exhibit without feeling that it aligned them with “Strongman” authoritarianism or that it contradicted or undermined their democratic aspirations.
So, at least based on my experience, I don’t feel that this type of exhibit was in Spring 1989 imbued with “widespread loss of faith in free politics, and a new yearning for Strongmen,” although I don’t doubt that later iterations might play into–and nourish–such “infatuations.”
Nick Kaldis <nkaldis@gmail.com>