A term coined by art critic Li Xianting to refer to an art style that prevailed in China in the mid-1990s and peaked in the 1999 exhibition ‘Centennial Rainbow: Gaudy Art’. Under the influence of American pop art and earlier Chinese art trends Political Pop and Cynical Realism, Gaudy Art appropriated the language of pop and folk culture in contemporary Chinese society to parody the parasitical but meaningless reproduction of cultural signifiers and traditional motifs. But unlike Political Pop and Cynical Realism where the political predicament was still a concern, Gaudy Art derived its motiving force more from enticements of consumer culture.