Contemporary Asian Art

A general category for art made since roughly 1980 in Central, East, and Southeast Asia. While the worldwide proliferation of biennials, fairs, and contemporary art museums has made the boundaries between regions more porous, Asia continues to sustain an extreme breadth of traditional practices. The rapid economic transformations of recent decades have had a significant impact on artists' works, manifest in a variety of styles including 1990s Political Pop in China, Takashi Murakami’s highly commercialized practice, or Indian artist Subodh Gupta’s monumental installations made from everyday objects. More direct political practice and performance have also been dominant tendencies of the last 20 years, the best known example being Chinese artist Ai Weiwei, who has become internationally recognized for his activist critique of state policy.