Battlegrounds. Net Art and Virtual Worlds in the Work of Chinese Artists

Abstract

Introduction-Art historian Wu Hunga, one of the first to describe contemporary Chinese art, suggested that in the Chinese context it should rather be called experimental (shiyan yishu) 1 then postmodern, as it diverges chronologically from the development of Western art. In 2005, he wrote that he saw the following stages: 1979-1984, the time of the formation of unofficial art; 1985-1989, known as the 'New Wave of Art '85' and the 'China/Avant-garde' exhibition in Beijing as a result of this period; then 1990-1993, when Chinese experimental art entered the world market; and finally, from 1994 to the present, art as a critique of the socio-cultural situation in China 2 . Now, after more than fifteen years, it would be appropriate to add further stages, including certainly the extremely intense development after 2004 of art using new information technologies and social media.