"Art" or "Artifacts" - from China
Will O. Whisp
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the entire 2-page article:
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/07/15/business/worldbusiness/15paint.html
At 26, Mr. Zhang estimates that he has painted up to 20,000 copies of van
Gogh's works in a paint-spattered third-floor garret here where freshly washed
socks and freshly painted canvases dry side-by-side on the balcony.
Ye Xiaodong, 25, is completing 200 paintings of a landscape of pink and white
flowers in his garret. A block away, Ye Xiaodong, 25, is completing 200
paintings of a landscape of pink and white flowers in another third-floor
garret. And down the street, Huang Yihong, also 25, stands in an art-packed
store and paints a waterfall tumbling gracefully into a pool, mixing the
paints on an oval palette.
Mr. Zhang and Mr. Ye said they did not mind painting hundreds of copies.
But Mr. Huang, the university graduate in the street-front store, aspires to
greater heights."I've never done more than four copies" of the same painting,
he said proudly, adding that to do more, "would be boring and very tiring."
Many of the paintings depict scenes that Chinese artists have never seen.
European landscapes, like the Mediterranean or Venice or Paris, are the best
sellers.
China is rapidly expanding art colleges, turning out tens of thousands of
skilled artists each year willing to work cheaply. The Internet is allowing
these assembly-line paintings to be sold all over the world. The same
technology allows families world-wide to arrange for their portraits to be
painted in coastal China.
China's ability to turn what has long been an individual craft into a mass
production industry may affect small-scale artists from Rome's Spanish Steps
to the sidewalks along Santa Monica's beach in California, as well as many
galleries and art colonies in between.
United States customs data show that imports of Chinese paintings nearly
tripled from 1996 to 2004, with bulk shipments reaching $30.5 million last
year. Retail sales are several times that, as the customs data are based on
the price that entrepreneurs pay for bulk purchases.
The economics of the Chinese oil painting industry - very few watercolors or
pastels are traded internationally - are striking. Mr. Zhang and Mr. Ye, who
both learned to paint by serving two-year apprenticeships after high school,
each earn less than $200 a month, plus modest room and board. Mr. Huang, who
earned a four-year art degree from Jiangxi Normal University in east-central
China, said he was paid $360 a month, but buys his own food and housing.
Wang Yuankang, a paintings entrepreneur at the Canton Trade Fair said his
factory had 10 "designers" who do original paintings and 300 painters who copy
these originals. Another 200 workers do the framing, he said.
Some operations are even larger. Vicky Leung, the business manager for the
Chaozhou Hongjia Arts and Crafts Company, with a booth near Mr. Wang's, said
that the company had two factories with a total of 10 designers, 250 painters
and more than 500 framers and assistant painters.
One advantage of the larger operations is that they allow specialization, with
simple assembly lines like those that Henry Ford brought to the automobile
industry.
The larger factories have some painters specializing in trees, others in
skies, others in flowers and so forth, an approach that not only improves
"quality" but also increases output and reduces costs.