Show of young artists at Art Nova in Beijing

One of the young artists who sold well at auction houses is 32-year-old Hao Liang. His hand scroll The Tale of Clouds went for 5.6 million yuan ($875,000) at Christie's Shanghai last fall. The report points out that the average price of works by Chinese under 35 years old is about $100,000, lower than their Western counterparts, who are likely to fetch $300,000 per work.

Art Nova usually selects works presented by artists themselves and takes them on tours within China and outside. This year, the number of attendees at the exhibition has increased to 3,000 from 800 five years ago.

Peng Wei, managing director of Art Nova, says that holding group exhibitions is still part of the learning experience for art agents in China. Her project also seeks to find corporate sponsorships and funding from public institutes for young artists.

Peng says that five years ago, there were few such platforms for young Chinese artists. Their establishment has successfully attracted people's attention to a generation of future artists. During the past two years, more than 10 projects have been held to promote and help young artists, according to the media.

Xu Jialing, curator of CYAP, another youth art project founded last year, says that although the number of such projects may look good, the larger question is: To what extent are young artists actually benefitting from them?

CYAP is a 10-year platform for youth art and gets the young connected with established artists, curators and critics.

"We still need to explore ways of helping the young effectively rather than just holding shows," Xu says.