Reproductive System

The book's name and cover caught my eye simultaneously. V.S. Naipaul's The Enigma of Arrival was illustrated with a similarly titled painting by Giorgio de Chirico, the Greek-Italian pre-Surrealist. I pored over the book, which describes the Trinidadian Nobel laureate's own coming to terms with living in southern England, a few miles from where I had grown up. Enthused and enthralled, I decided I wanted the painting, too.

The original, in private hands in New York, was out of my physical and financial reach. Then Tamara, my wife (who speaks fluent Cantonese), suggested Da Fen, the reproduction-art village in Shenzhen—the southern Chinese city roughly two hours by train and taxi from our Hong Kong home. Founded by Hong Kong painter Huang Jiang in 1989, Da Fen now hosts around 600 studios and 5,000 artists living out the Maoist dictum of "more, better, cheaper, faster."

Not for nothing is Da Fen known as the art world's assembly plant. As we walked its grid, we were greeted by a phantasmagoric palette of Rubens, Da Vinci and Van Gogh copies. Painting quietly in an alleyway, one young artist seemed to find us rather than vice versa. As Tamara translated, he cast an appreciative eye over a printout of De Chirico's Enigma, and promised a 2-sq.-ft. canvas reproduction, in a fortnight, for $60.

Rarely have I greeted a courier with such alacrity. Unrolled, the painting was little short of a miracle. The Da Fen artist had caught not just the colors and De Chirico's subtle shading, but the entire mood of the work. My Enigma had arrived.