Hello Kitty (with a little bit of hell)

The London Financial Times reports that China has overtaken France as a market for art sales.

According to a nameless art critic:

It is simply emblematic of the French decline. There hasn't been a brilliant French artist since the second world war.

China claims 15 of the 35 artists worldwide who command seven-digit sales, and the country's artists have seen prices rise eight-fold in the past seven years.

Last year I visited the art district of Tank Loft in Chongqing.

The area is decked out in ways that we can only dream:

At the center of the district is a network of artists' studios, located on the campus of the Sichuan Fine Arts Institute that's been designed with knowing understanding of military-industrial chic.

I've blogged elsewhere  about floors rendered smooth by the procession of Western art dealers and curators who have made pilgrimage here.

But what's great about the place is that alongside the professional artists is a network of studios of artists who are students at the Institute, like Liao Man:

Just check out her work.

Yes, it's saccharin and self-conscious.

And no, it doesn't command seven-digit receipts.

But there's a quiet, ironic exorcism and joke/celebration of consumerism going on here that loses nothing in translation.

Every image of her face bears a red mark that's a scar.