For our last day in Shenzhen we were on our own and went to visit the Dafen Art Village, a sort of quasi-old, kinda fake new art enclave in the midst of high-rise Shenzhen. It has a fascinating blend of street life and storefront small business, most of which are making oil painting copies of art - good, bad, and worse. We found great portraits of Mao, and Susie promptly bought one for her son. Luckily, in the intense heat, we found a beautiful oasis of a shop to sit in and try and cool off. It was a very calm Zen-like space, quite different from the rest of the city.
Then we headed back to the hotel and that night went to an art opening, where we met the only ironic Chinese person of our trip, a hip guy who had a sister on Long Island, wouldn't you know ... The young woman whose work was being shown was quite sweet. She did malevolent paintings of cats. Really. The gallery was in a very lovely part of the city, a small area of reclaimed warehouses that just screamed art space. I am sure it will soon be over-gentrified like all such places. Love it while you can.
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