"Hyperfake" reproductions from Da Fen Oil Painting Village

Houses of Parliament, London, originally uploaded by jough [formerly jough].

Kevin Kelly has a fantastic write-up about a "counterfeit painting city" in China. Artists in Da Fen paint original reproductions of famous works. "Re-painting masters," Mr. Kelly notes, "is a venerable activity [...] What's new here is the scale of this re-work, which brings down its cost similar to machine reproduction."

If you could walk into an art store and purchase a re-painting for the same price as a print, which would you rather have? The machine-printed copy may be more technically accurate compared to the original, but a hand-painted image is infinitely nearer in spirit. Given a choice between the two, I would prefer to own an actual oil painting, even with some imperfections.

There is an energy imbued in objects that are created by human beings. I would go as far as to say that the Chinese reproductions are "art" more than a poster of the same painting is "art." Are they on the same level as the original work? Of course not. But I would value a human original, even if it's a "copy," more highly than a mechanical copy. Now where can I get my hands on one of these?