Oh Yeah, We've Got One of Those Too

I'm sure China's Camel Joe art star, Zhou Tiehai, likes to think of himself as the Chinese second coming of Andy Warhol (or even Marcel Duchamp), but his actual American counterpart is the would-be provocateur (if anyone were paying enough attention to be provoked) Mark Kostabi.

From the NYTimes (while taking a cheep jab in its title: Chinese Artist Zhou Tiehai Proves the Emperor Is Naked):

... Zhou Tiehai came up with an ambitious plan to make himself famous.

He would succeed by beating the art market at its own game, exposing its commercialism while exploiting it to the hilt. He would produce paintings that he hoped would be acclaimed by the same Western collectors and journalists who, in his mind, had advanced the careers of too many mediocre Chinese artists.

And he would do all this without lifting a brush: he would delegate that work to hirelings.

Somehow, he pulled it off. Mr. Zhou is now one of China's hottest artists.

Hooray for him. It's good to see that cynical art isn't merely limited to the western wing of the art world. Unfortunately for collectors, this work is probably going to be worthless in about twenty years.