Media Art in Beijing

A dispatch on the arts, technologies and cultures in the metropolitan community served by the Beijing airport. by Zhenhua Li The complex and diverse history of me-dia art in Beijing parallels the free and random growth of new political and eco-nomic models in China. It used to be said, “Beijing will no longer be Beijing with-out the Hutongs. Today’s skyscrapers could be from any city in the world.” Whether or not the radical alterations of the city’s skyline and neighborhoods will render Beijing anonymous and unrecog-nizable is not yet known, but the devel-opment of media art in the city has risen in tandem with these sweeping changes. gies for media art. In addition, numer-ous other works were exhibited that com-bined art and philosophy with all sorts of methods enabled by new media. Thus Chinese audiences and artists alike be-gan to accept media art; this led in 200