Resolutely overthrow Liu Shaoqi

This poster makes a direct reference to Mao Zedong’s May 16 Circular of 1966 that criticized his Communist party rivals and launched the Cultural Revolution. By inciting student activists, later called Red Guards, Mao managed to purge the party leaders he came to mistrust. Here, the prominent Red Guard literally grabs by the hair the cartoon heads of Liu Shaoqi, Deng Xiaoping, and others, whom Mao accused of “having let all of the ox-demons and snake-spirits out of their cages.” Liu Shaoqi, Mao’s handpicked successor, had fallen out of favor and was criticized as the Chinese version of Krushchev; Liu’s facial features are exaggerated here to resemble the Soviet leader. One of the prominent slogans on this poster reads: “He who fears not being cut to pieces dares to unhorse the emperor,” the emperor being Liu Shaoqi. Propaganda posters appropriated gestures and poses from the choreography of revolutionary operas promoted by Mao’s wife Jiang Qing, as seen in the gun-wielding Red Guards at lower right. Mao appears as the red sun that emanates red rays, symbolizing the authority of his directives and his personality cult now pervading the country.Mao’s call to students to purge the party’s enemies mobilized millions of young activists to “struggle” all rightists and antirevolutionaries. Thus began a period of unprecedented destruction that included attacking anyone and anything considered old or bourgeois.