Fade to Black

Tranquility Comes from Meditation by Gu Wenda, 1985. Courtesy of the Metropolitan Museum of Art

On the last day of 2013, I hurried my husband and children through the bitter, late afternoon cold and up the sweeping outdoor staircase of New York's Metropolitan Museum of Art.  We were going to see "Ink Art: Past as Present in Contemporary China," the august American museum's first major exhibition of contemporary Chinese art (which runs until April 6).