Crisis hits copycats in Chinese art enclave
With his long hair and crumpled shirt, Chen Honglin looks every inch the budding artist, but these days he thinks less about expressing himself and more about surviving in China's fake art capital.
The 24-year-old, who has spent the past year making meticulous copies of famous paintings at the Dafen Art Village in southern China, asks himself how much longer he can last as orders drop sharply amid the economic crisis.
"It's something we talk about among ourselves," said Chen, who hails from northwest China's destitute Shaanxi province. "I'd be lying if I said we weren't somewhat worried."
The craft of copying, a vital element in China's economic rise, has literally been turned into an art form in this laid-back enclave in the middle of the nation's most thoroughly industrialised region.
Vincent van Gogh-style sunflowers and Jackson Pollock-esque drip paintings are to be had for just a little over 100 yuan (14.5 dollars), and to the untrained eye it is not immediately obvious that these are just replicas.
This is the work of hundreds of creative 20-somethings who have gravitated from across the vast nation to Dafen, where a decent income could be combined with a Bohemian lifestyle in a pleasantly warm climate.
But as foreign interest has weakened, a slightly jittery atmosphere has set in among the hundreds of artists who live here, many of them highly trained even if they mainly occupy themselves with reproducing other people's work.
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