And, in a city of 24million, that approach is key, Craig Easton says.
Mr Easton fell in love with the city in 2012, when he spent a month as an international artist in residence at East China Normal University while studying towards a PhD in abstract painting.
"I remember walking back to the hotel one rainy night ... dodging a raft of charging umbrellas, and all I could think about was ‘how do I get to live here?"’
That began to happen for Mr Easton in 2014, when he visited again, and by 2016 he was living and working in the city — staging solo shows, getting involved in group projects and exhibitions.
Now he has a studio space, which he shares with Chinese artist and collaborator Joyce Huang, and is working on their joint ventures and his own solo shows, while soaking up the Shanghai experience.
"Living here is so completely different from visiting. The streets, the lights, the traffic, the heat, the rain, the air even — they all get under your skin.
"It pulls you in — 24million people on the move makes for a pretty powerful vortex."
He spent most of his time in Shanghai, between trips to Melbourne or Dunedin.
And, as Shanghai’s art scene continues to expand, younger artists kept one eye on centres like Dunedin even as they helped fuel a rising sense of contemporary culture in China, he said.
"I don’t think a lot of people in business, or whatever sector, quite get how important the cultural element is here.
"How else do you get to know what people are really about if you’re not engaging in their contemporary culture?
"So Dunedin, with its focus on being a city of art and ideas, seems to win some respect here beyond what they might otherwise get."
