Fifty-five years ago this May, yet another aspiring painter arrived in Paris. The French capital was then the mecca for artists from around the world, but 34-year-old Chu Teh-Chun (Zhu Dequn), who is being honored by a major retrospective this month at the National Art Museum of China (NAMOC), had traveled particularly long and far to reach the city of his dreams. His study of art had begun almost 20 years before at the China Academy of Art in Hangzhou, and from the first time he looked inside a book of Western painting he knew Paris was where he wanted to be.

Here’s one for art lovers, especially those interested in local artists. Recently we stumbled upon ArtSpeak China (ASC), described as “a bilingual, online resource devoted to contemporary Chinese art.”

Rumors have been circulating for some time that Caochangdi, the area past Dashanzi that’s home to a number of high-profile galleries, may be razed for redevelopment, but it’s far from the only “art zone” under threat by voracious real estate agents. Red Box Review recently published an overview of the areas under pressure.

After the visual stimulation of wandering a gallery or museum, you want the tactile pleasure of taking those cutting-edge artworks into your very own hands. These stores oblige by selling affordable art-inspired items.

At the risk of sounding uncultured, let me preface this by saying I rarely enjoy stage performances. The last one I went to, a modern dance filled with white leotards, prancing and strange noises, left me wondering if perhaps I just don’t understand performance dance.

THE PATHFINDER
Huang Rui
In 1979, as one of the Stars group, Huang Rui staged the first-ever exhibition of Chinese contemporary art. Twenty years later, he put 798 on the map when he moved in, established his studio there and opened its first café. A born pioneer, he creates work that is never easy, as he marries a deep feeling for Chinese culture with sharp criticism of where it’s going.

It would be a bit of a cliche to call this collection of galleries, bars, restaurants and shops near Andingmen the new 798. But it kind of is. 

David Quammen has a gift not many people do: the ability to understand scientific writing. What makes Quammen special though, is he then turns all that jargon into words that are comprehensible, compelling explanations of complicated ideas. The bridge he builds between the scientific community and the rest of us is a facinating one to cross, and lucky for us, he's coming to visit!

Liu Heung Shing is a living legend in Chinese photography circles. The Hong Kong-born photographer took his first professional images in China following Mao’s death in 1976, and over the following seven years produced an extraordinary body of work capturing daily life in a rapidly transforming nation.

You don’t have to be in China for long to notice that you’re surrounded by a mass of seemingly indecipherable pictographic symbols. “What a crazy, irrational linguistic system!” you may think. You’re free to think that, but remember that each of these characters is a piece of art in itself, and representative of thousands of years of Chinese history and culture.

Paul Wang, a calligraphy teacher at the China Culture Center, teaches students not only the correct way to write characters, but also the significance and history behind them. Stone Yu spoke to Wang Laoshi about hanzi and the stories behind a few of Wang’s favorite characters.