The commonly accepted story is that the Chinese invented gunpowder and used it for celebrations, then Europeans took it and used it to kill people. I love how Chinese artist Cai Guoqiang is playing on this narrative to create amazing site-specific art, such as this recent day-time fireworks display at the Arab Museum of Modern Art.

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Xiuyan Zhang’s artworks seem to move before your eyes. Smooth lines, somewhat chilling and yet intriguing characters and an Eastern style, how can you look at this art and not feel a sudden urge to draw?

Graphic designer Aram Bartholl is showing his support for Chinese artist Ai Weiwei with these these awesome F**k Everything glasses. You, too, can can wear these cynical shades and show your support by downloading the PDF here. Download, print, cut, and enjoy! Who doesn’t love D.I.Y art with a message?

Growing up during China’s Cultural Revolution and eventually immigrating to Canada in 1991, painter Lui Liu draws heavily from Chinese and Western themes to create his feverishly surreal images.

Lu Cong’s cultural identity, split between mainland China where he was born in 1978 and small-town Midwest where he immigrated to 11 years later, informs his beautiful portraits mostly of white, American women. The images harken back to old cigarette ads from pre-Communist China, as well as the 18th-century Romantics in the West.

The dynamics of sexuality and romance are probably the most significant in a person’s assimilation or lack thereof in any culture, and Lu’s biography allows him to skirt a delicate line that turns the un-questioned orientalism and the unspoken emasculation of the Asian male on their heads while simultaneously empowering and revering his subjects.

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Carrying on the tradition of Giuseppe Arcimboldo, Chinese artist Ju Duoqi has recreated a bunch of iconic paintings using photos of vegetables.

When you hear the phrase ‘looks good enough to eat’, you might stop to look if it’s in reference to the new work by Chinese artist Yu Duoki (Ju Duoqi). These semi-beautiful cabbage women will make eating your veggies seem somewhat cannibalistic.

As Chinese artist Li Wei points out, all we really truly want is to be able to escape the banal rules and regulations of this reality.

In contrast to Cai Guoqiang’s fascination with explosions and bombast, Chinese artist Yin Xiuzhen’s large-scale installation, invite viewers in with structures made of fabric and found clothing. Rather than creating loud dramatic statements, she poses small questions about gender identity.

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Chinese artist Xia Xiaowan’s 3D paintings using multiple panes of glass to create depth are simple in concept, but the results are pretty captivating. His pieces look like strange cloud people appearing out of the ether.

Chinese illustrator and comic artist Xiao Bai has studied traditional Chinese painting since a young age. Her slick and beautiful illustration work features mostly females, and almost all of her characters have a tattoo. This is influenced by her other job as a tattoo artist. Xiao Bai has worked for various magazines and publications, in both China and France. She is also an active member of the local Association of Illustrators in China.

I love this series of color etchings by Chinese artist, Luo Tao. Of the project, she says: ‘since the 2008 Olympic games, China has grown like a giant and been frequently commented about by the British media. I have drawn on my perspective as a native Chinese person to comment on aspects of Chinese culture and education. I have this done through etching images that combine political satire, allegory and dark humor’.

Chinese artist Wang Guangle has used terrazzo tiles — the preferred floor tiles in Chinese institutional buildings — as inspiration for six years now. His early paintings were realist renderings of light hitting the pieces of polymer resin infused with flecks of marble, but eventually the artist turned his entire canvases into tiles, abstracting the images. In some of his more recent works, he imitated the tradition from his home town where elderly people put a layer of paint on their coffins each year until they die.

Wang paints layers of colorful paint in cross section, commenting on the passage of time, patience, and the inevitability of death. Though at first glance, much of his work seems minimal and simplistic, his creative process revolves around meticulous attention to detail and a painstaking methodology.

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Lu Hao is an incredible Chinese artist who paints meticulous and insanely detailed depictions of organized everyday collections in China, like shelves of CDRs, all painted with ink on silk. You won’t believe it even when you see it!