Creativity Class: Art School and Culture Work in Postsocialist China

"With a fluid writing style, "Creativity Class" describes the self-styling practices of visual art workers in three decades of post-Socialist China and looks at the training that Chinese students receive in art prep schools and academies. This book stands out for its focus on student training and provides much-needed insight into how creativity is practiced in one of the fastest growing creative industries in the world."--Ling-Yun Tang, University of Hong Kong

"Based on extensive fieldwork in Beijing and smaller Chinese cities, this important book paints a vivid portrait of the roles that institutions, social networks, and imagined communities play in the creation of artists and creative industry workers in China. With telling details, Chumley sheds light on the globalization of creative industries and the contradictory effects that China's ambitions to acquire soft power through cultural influence abroad are having on the lives of young people."--Teri Silvio, Institute of Ethnology, Academia Sinica