Zhao Kailin's "The Dream Back to Tang Dynasty", 2010 (Courtesy of Eli Klein Fine Art)

There can be no doubt that what makes Chinese contemporary art so universally powerful and internationally prominent is its uncanny ability to visually voice the modernist angst within a world that is constantly changing.  Perhaps more than any other country (along with India, I would say) China’s artists have managed to consistently understand that modern day uncertainty transcends borders.  As such, this angst does not belong to any particular individual or country but is, instead, embedded within the collective sensibility.  It is a universal human theme.

Much has been made of the drastic economic change and consequent modernization within China and the ensuing problems which accompany such rapid socio-economic transformation. While there is no doubt that this reality has played a significant role in Chinese contemporary art, it only half-answers why Chinese contemporary art has developed such international appeal.

Luo Qing's "2008 AD", 2009, Courtesy of Eli Klein Fine Art

The real answer lies in the “immediacy of the modernist angst” that is so apparent in Chinese contemporary art, an immediacy that is a direct reflection of the “sudden and present” nature of  China’s growth.

Unlike the Western World’s Industrial Revolution which occurred over a one hundred year span, China’s “industrial revolution” is taking place in the now.  Moreover, it is happening in a much more condensed time span.  This is also amplified by modern communications which allows one to both personally witness and experience first hand the different aspects of these changes. The Western world hasn’t lived through the drastic changes of radical modernization the way China’s people have.  The Western world has not gone from black to white within the span of a few years.  China has and it is this immediacy that China’s contemporary artists have been able to translate onto their canvasses.

Zhang Dali's "Slogan B5", 2009, Courtesy of Eli Klein Fine Art

In turn, this immediacy resonates with our Western world’s present preoccupation with political and economic uncertainty.  The words terror and recession no longer belong in the sphere of “the other”.  9/11 shattered the Western world’s comfort zone and left, in its onslaught, an angst not unconnected to that experienced by China in the wake of its radical socio-economic change.

Like so many of their contemporaries, the art of Zhao Kailin, Luo Qing, Zhang Dali, and Jiang Huan explores the pervading sense of alienation that often accompanies the individual’s navigation through an uncertain world.  These artists, along with a number of others, are being exhibited at Eli Klein Fine Art until March 1.

Jiang Huan's "Nanna's Sunday", 2009, Courtesy of Eli Klein Fine Art

If you are in New York, the Eli Klein gallery is well worth a visit.  If you walk away with anything, it will be this:  the Contemporary Chinese art scene did not explode onto the Western art market because of its sensationalist subject matter or its sensationalist marketing strategy.  What puts contemporary Chinese art at the forefront is its ability to speak directly to the global citizen of today.

In fact, China’s “Pursuit of New” can be dubbed China’s New Reality.  Nowhere is this new reality more accessible than in the virtual world where a few clicks inside the right video game can create a perfect world.  The virtual world – and its effect on the human psyche – is explored in the art of Cao Fei.

Drawing upon the obscure line separating reality from virtual fantasy, Fei’s RMB City: A Second Life City Planning by Cao Fei, explores China’s relationship to communism and consumerism.  Through machinima (creating videos by using video games as the medium, in this case the “video game”, Second Life) Fei’s futuristic city is set to music that sounds eerily reminiscent to that of a carousel.  Fei’s world spins – both literally and figuratively – in constant motion.   Technology – represented by smoke stacks, military boats, cars, trucks, and a bike wheel representing the world’s biggest observation wheel in Beijing  – rules the city.  Any references to China’s history, such as Chinese architecture, is glossed over.  Ditto for Chinese iconic symbols like the panda that floats in the air like a carnival balloon (Pink Floyd’s pink pig?) and China’s flag that is spread like a carnival tent, its dismantled stars acting as little more than accessories, rather than symbolic representations of China’s Communist regime and its citizens.  In i.Mirror, another machinima, Fei’s SL avatar (her Second Life persona), China Tracy, is both participant and observer of a world in which she simultaneously longs to be a part of and apart from.

He Sen's Come Together (2008) (Jack Tilton Gallery)

Beautiful and desirable – this is what you think when you look at the women portrayed in He Sen’s large scale photo realistic paintings.  Scantily dressed, his women lounge languidly on couches and in beds, offering us little more than their beauty.  Their depth is no greater than that of the piggy banks and teddy bears they hold.  Yeah I’m beautiful, they seem to say, and who are you? Their vacuous gaze travels beyond the viewer in their narcissistic inability to consider anything other than their own frivolous wants, desires, and addictions symbolized by teddy bears, piggy banks, and smoking.  Not unintentionally, Sen’s use of faux ink drawing, reminiscent of Chinese landscape painting, incorporates a forgotten past into a present reality.  His plastic pink pig is another deviation of an ancient Chinese symbol signifying fertility and virility.  Ironically, children born in the Year of the Pig, are happy and honest yet there is nothing of either in Sen’s women.  We are drawn to their beauty much in the same way we might be drawn to a glossy magazine page featuring a car.  In effect, Sen’s art mirrors not only China’s fixation with consumerism, but our own as well.

There is so much to the ongoing “newness” of China, it is what has always historically  intrigued the West. There is more to come.

Christie's Images Ltd. - Zeng Fanzhi's "Mask Series 1996 No. 6". A record for Chinese Contemporary Art of US$ 9.7M was paid in 2008.

In May, 2008, contemporary Chinese artist Zeng Fanzhi’s “Mask Series 1996 No.6” sold for U.S$9.07 million at the Christie’s Hong Kong art auction.  A month earlier, another contemporary Chinese artist, Zhang Xiaogang, sold his “Bloodline: Big Family No.3” for U.S.$6.06 million at the Sotheby’s Hong Kong art auction.  In case you are wondering, Fanzhi was born in 1964.  Xiaogang is a little older.  He was born in 1958.

Could anyone have predicted these prices?  Apparently not even the auction catalogues predicted such prices judging by their pre-sale estimates.   On a slightly more personal note, I recently walked into a not-too-snooty art gallery.  The gallery director was forthcoming, and genuinely believed in his artists but then – “You should get this artist before his prices go up” – pops out of his mouth.  Nothing bothers me more than a gallery director telling me that I should buy NOW before the somewhat affordable piece I’m looking at appreciates by 20% or more.

First and foremost, what is it about my clothes and appearance that makes gallery director think: Look lady, buy now because chances are you’ll never be able to afford more than what the artist is currently valued at!

Second, what guarantees I won’t contact the artist directly and hound him until he has a nervous break-down and sells me his piece for half-price?

Zhang Xiaogang's "Bloodline: The big family no. 3". (Artnet.com)

Third, even if the snowball does survive hell and the work in question does demand a  million dollars plus while I’m still alive and faculty-intact– so what?  Do I allow myself to get pressure-pushed into buying a piece on the sole criteria that there’s a molecular off-chance it will exceed its current value by an astronomical jump?

All of which leads to the ever-enigmatic question: What is art worth?

I guess for some things the answer is fairly straightforward.  Take real estate, for example, and its “three golden rules” – location, location, location. The value of art, however, is not so straightforward.  It is too subjective, too volatile, and too dependent on the pricing policy of the gallery and something Adam Smith called “the Invisible Hand” (Don Thompson elaborates on this point in his book,  The $12 Million Stuffed Shark).  Assuming that talent is a material part of this equation, then talent should be guarantee enough.  Sure, but in the unpredictable world of creativity what does talent mean and what does talent guarantee?

I remember watching Wicked on Broadway and thinking how absolutely brilliant every actor’s performance was.  Now ponder this:  For every actor on stage, there are at least a few thousand (and I’m being conservative) equally talented, equally brilliant actors who are barely making ends meet by waiting on tables.  Same thing for artists – it’s enough to make you push your artistically-inclined kid into medicine or law.

Ultimately, how much a work will be worth is unpredictable.   So perhaps the question to ask when considering a work of art is this:   Will I still love it and will it still speak to me if it is only worth the value of paint and canvas?