Map of China: A Perspective On the Shifting Position of China’s Contemporary Art Scene in The Context of Globalisation

The aim of this paper is to analyse how ongoing globalizing tendencies, through the reconfiguration of the previously Western-dominant epistemic framework, have bolstered the visibility of the Chinese art scene. The dissemination of “contemporaneity” as the prevalent theoretical paradigm in art history (Osborne, Foster, Agamben) has facilitated the questioning of the past socio-economic and ideological modes of organization, marking the insertion of the “non-European alterity” (Mignolo) within a predominantly Eurocentric framework. The theoretical project of contemporaneity is usually understood through the lenses of heterogeneity and plurality. As such, the main objective of a “contemporary” approach is that of synchronizing the extant discrepancy between different spaces and temporalities, such an imperative becoming visible in the cultural sector, where contemporary artists are shaping a new intellectual ethos through novel spaces of global encounter. Therefore, certain previously neglected art scenes (deemed as “primitive” by the norms of the Western canon) have received increased critical attention, becoming pivotal agents in the articulation of the artistic praxes nowadays. This being the case for the Chinese art scene, I examine how this repositioning has stirred a new global artistic dynamic, highlighting the strategies that propelled China to a leading position on the art market.