"It seems like my destiny, rather than my choice," says Dong Mengyang when summing up his 15 years as an art exhibition organizer.

Dong, the executive director of "Art Beijing," the annual contemporary art show in China's capital, has come a long way.

Dong was born in Shanxi Province. In 1992, he graduated from China Central Academy of Fine Arts in Beijing, the country's top arts education institution. Because he wanted to remain in Beijing after college, he had to get a job with a government-run company to receive a 'hukou,' or residency permit, to stay in the capital.

"At the beginning it was simply for a 'hukou,'" Dong said, explaining his decision to accept a job offer from a state-owned company specializing in art and culture.

After Dong was hired by the China National Culture & Art Co. Ltd. (CNCAC), he was assigned to organize the "China Art Exposition," the first-ever art expo held in China since 1993.

"My job was to provide all kinds of services to the exhibitors, who by then were basically individual artists rather than art galleries," Dong said. "And for quite a long time I didn't expect much from the work."

Dong recalled there were very few art galleries in China at the time and no market for artwork or art industry as such.

"But I did see a need for the artists and the art dealers to have a place to communicate and do business together," he said.

Dong's proposal for an art gallery expo was turned down by his boss at CNCAC, who doubted its feasibility given the relatively few number of art galleries in China. "The difference between him and me was that I saw Beijing not only as a big city in China, but also as a platform for art professionals in Asia, even the world," Dong said.

With the passion of a pioneer, Dong quit his job at the state-owned company and started the "China International Gallery Exposition" (CIGE) in 2004.

"The gallery expo responded to the strong impulse of the rising Chinese art market," Dong said. "It also brought changes for me, as I finally realized my destiny, where my future lay."

The gallery expo gave Chinese audiences an overview of global art galleries, with foreign galleries, mainly Asian and European, making up a significant portion (47 out of the total 68 in 2004). They have become a fixture at the CIGE. In 2008, at the fifth CIGE, 61 art galleries of a total 81 were from Asia and Europe.

Now Dong has even bigger plans. He left the CIGE after the 2005 exhibition to start "Art Beijing" the following year, with the aim of helping to promote Chinese art galleries in their homeland.

As the host city of the 2008 Olympics, Beijing came into world focus and established itself as a benchmark for the art industry in China and Asia, exemplified by the capital's now famous art zones such as 798 and Songzhuang.

"You don't see art blocks of such scale in any other city in the world," Dong said.

"At 'Art Basel,' in Switzerland, the world's largest art expo, you seldom see Chinese art galleries represented. It's a bit like the Chinese sprinter Liu Changchun participating in the Los Angeles Olympics in 1932 as the only Chinese athlete."

Dong wants "Art Beijing" to serve as a stage for Chinese art galleries to be seen by the world.

"'Art Beijing 2008,' the third consecutive year of the annual expo, is showtime for 58 Chinese art galleries along with 36 foreign exhibitors.

"Now I see the expo as a game, a game full of chances and challenges," Dong said. "We will go on year after year with continuous hard work and progress."

After all, he said, art gallery expos in China are "a long and winding road."