Michael Wolf: Real Fake Art
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150,00€
About
In the early 2000s Michael Wolf took pictures of Chinese copy-artists with their works in the city of Shenzhen.
He didn't just pose the fakers in their environment, but played with the background or the elements surrounding them, creating similarities. The copyist is placed with his painting in an environment reminiscent of the copied work in small details, like a new work inspired by the original. Each page becomes an opportunity for the reader to look for these similarities.
In front of typical Chinese urban backdrops young Chinese women and men present oil paintings by American and European artists from different epochs: Rembrandt, Van Gogh, Warhol, Hockney, Magritte, Hopper, Richter... All pictures of a multi-million dollar industry. A production of copies of popular artworks, which are sold at giveaway prices into the whole world. The handpainted copies mainly come from China, the buyers can almost entirely be found in the United States and Europe, the countries of origin of the unaffordable originals.
The result of this work also raises the question of the democratisation of art and its place in a world of consumerism. Who are the potential buyers? What motivates them to buy a pale copy of a masterpiece, a painted copy of a photograph?
Essay by Boris von Brauchitsch.
Condition: Very Good
Michael Wolf: Real Fake Art
114 pages
English
Published by Peperoni books in 2011
32 x 25cm
