Red Sea no{1}. 2, Shao Yinong and Mu Chen - 2003, C-Type print

Kay Carson takes a great leap forward by pondering the dynamic between the private and the public at the Chinese Arts Centre.

One big, happy family… or a constructed ideal with multiple personalities destined to burst forth?

Ten artists are exploring the connotations of Collective Identity in a politically pensive exhibition at Manchester’s Chinese Arts Centre.

Running until April 1 2007, the show attempts to break through the mass consciousness model, examining the dynamics between private and public.

The uniformity - conformity, even - and quiet repetition of Wang Jingson’s paper handscroll Taichi, portrays the slow, deliberate movements of the ancient martial art, but is a perfect metaphor for the nation’s cultural hegemony of oneness.

Contrast this with Wu Yiming’s depiction of the modern Shanghai in A Half Mile Of The City. “Who are you?” it asks, amid a willowy, wobbly paper album of faceless urbanites. Two very different epochs; but the struggle for individuality appears consistently invisible nonetheless.

Chao (Tide), C-type print, 259 x 129cm, Miao Xiaochun

Altitude Zero, an engaging installation by Hu Jieming of twin portholes each featuring an interactive screen, brings the room to life. As we peer through the windows, junk bobs about in the sea, but is punctuated by a plastic dummy that crashes against the porthole glass. Is this an alarm call for the disposable society? Are we all washed up?

The uber-pixelation of Shao Yinong and Mu Chen’s Red Sea reflects nostalgically upon the whole being greater than the sum of its parts; in this case, a body of people marching in perfect unison and waving their flags. Look at them from a distance and you get the picture quite clearly - but close-up there is a different truth as each person loses his or her form.

In Chao (Tide), a C-type print which justifiably dominates one wall, Miao Xiaochun has encapsulated perfectly the neo-collectivisation of the Chinese people. The communal nature has been rebranded. It’s new; it’s better; it washes whiter. The size and depth of colour of the piece heightens reality just enough for its clarity to be disturbing.

People in Kumming Province, holding Mao's portrait during foundation of People's Republic parade [1]. Photo by China (National) Photo Service

Hundreds of people are immersed in the hustle of a city street among buses and cars, while on the buildings and shop fronts, western-style billboard adverts for perfume and cosmetics, featuring Chinese models, jockey for position. Consumerism reigns. Red book has been replaced by Red Door.

But listen to the message of Spring Story and each word hits deeper and more hypnotically than the last. Yang Zhenzhong’s video has 1,500 factory workers reciting phrases from Deng Xiaoping’s 1992 speech where he publicly advocated market-orientated economic reforms for the country.

Aurally it’s rhythmic and, visually, rather clinical as young people in white coats are made to look as though they speak with one voice.

People celebrating and carrying their red books, photo by Xinhua News Agency

They work for one of the world’s leading computer companies, showing that perhaps the one big, happy family could now be a global one.