Converging On Canvas

Documentary paints rich picture of Chinese artists reproducing Western masterpieces. Guo Ying and Yuan Quan report.

Photographer and filmmaker Yu Haibo first visited Dafen, a suburb of Shenzhen, South China's Guangdong province, in 2004.

The trip to the area helped Yu form bonds with local painters such as Zhao Xiaoyong, who came from rural Hunan province, and Zhou Yongjiu, also from a peasant family. Zhao, Zhou and many others like them became part of Dafen's reputation as a "village of oil paintings" - churning out reproductions of Western masterpieces such as Vincent van Gogh's portraits and sunflowers that end up on shelves and walls worldwide.