Since the beginning of China's economic boom in the late 1980s and its ever-increasing influence on globalized society, the country's burgeoning contemporary art scene has attracted great attention around the world. However, despite the Chinese art market's emergence as a highly prolific industry and a growing international recognition of contemporary art from China, there is a remarkable lack of Chinese women artists represented in (inter-)national exhibitions and publications. Stepping Out! is the first comprehensive publication in 25 years to present a broadly representative selection of the work of contemporary Chinese female artists, including pioneering as well as emerging artists thus far little-known abroad. Through an enormous wealth of perspectives, the artists reveal their personal and social fears, contradictions, and hopes in the tense field occupied by powerful tradition, and shed light upon the search for identity both as women and as artists within a rapidly changing Chinese society.

Stepping Out! features more than 100 artworks by 26 artists born between 1960 and 1994 living in mainland China, including Cao Fei, Lin Tianmiao, Luo Yang, Ma Qiusha, Tong Wenmin, Wen Hui, Xiao Lu, Xing Danwen, and Yin Yiuzhen.