半坡国际艺术区

This guide to Banpo International Art District in Xi'an starts with Cold War concrete: a Soviet-built dye and printing factory raised in the 1950s, once the pride of the province and known locally as small Shanghai. It follows the factory's decline as western China turned from textiles to electronics, and the empty halls sitting for years until 2007, when artists including Baiye and Wang Fenghua let themselves into the abandoned sheds and built studios among the rust, working by cheap space and light through broken windows alone.