Assuming no previous background knowledge of Chinese history and culture, this concise yet comprehensive and richly-illustrated book will appeal to those who already have an established interest in modern Chinese art and those for whom this is a novel topic. It will be of particular value to students of Chinese art or modern art in general, but it is also for those in the wider reading public with a curiosity about modern China. At a time when that country has become a major actor on the world stage in all sorts of ways, accessible sources of information concerning its modern visual culture are nevertheless surprisingly scarce. As a consequence, a fully nuanced picture of China’s place in the modern world remains elusive. China—Art—Modernity is a timely remedy for that situation.
‘Here is a book that offers a comprehensive account of the dizzying transformations of Chinese art and society in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. Breaking free of conventional dichotomies between traditional and modern, Chinese and Western that have hobbled earlier studies, Clarke’s highly original book is exactly what I would assign my own students. Anyone eager to understand developments in China within the global history of modern art should read this book.’ —Robert E. Harrist Jr., Columbia University
‘Clarke’s book presents a critically astute mapping of the arts of modern and contemporary China. It highlights the significance of urban and industrial contexts, migration, diasporas and the margins of the mainland, while imaginatively seeking to inscribe its subject into the broader story of modern art. A timely and reliable intervention—and indispensable for the student and non-specialist reader.’ —Shane McCausland, SOAS University of London