Paint the West Red

The sound was deep, resonant and clear. For the unveiling of My Sydney at the Museum of Contemporary Art in March last year, Chinese performance artist Zhang Huan oversaw the ritualized shearing of a sheep, whose wool he later walked over, before a Buddhist temple bell was struck by a life-size bronze cast of the artist's naked body. For whom the bell tolls These days in the world of contemporary art, it seems to be tolling for China - from established art stars like Zhang and gunpowder virtuoso Cai Guo-Qiang to the new generation of artists, spawned by the sprawling...