Born in 1982 in Sichuan, DU Kun graduated from the Fourth Studio of Department of Oil Painting, China Central Academy of Fine Arts. During his college years, DU was ever enthusiastic about musical creation, and released albums with the musical team named after him. After graduating in 2007, he began creating fine art works. In 2009, Mr. MIZUMA Sueo discovered DU’s artistic talents and signed contract with him as his exclusive agent.

The show is titled A Stolen World; DU said this was the one-time name of a musical forum, which repeatedly played a melancholy and aerial piano piece whenever the viewers opened its website. The whole background of the forum’s web pages was black, depressing, and the radio there often recommended wonderful pieces of music. However, the forum just disappeared without leaving a clue, as if it were stolen, as like the name. As a matter of faith, DU believes that this world, apparently beautiful but actually rotten, too would suddenly disappear one day, just like the black-backgrounded forum that had been playing wonderful music day after day.

In his view, human beings have asked too much from nature, never getting satisfied or understanding gratitude, and came to believe that human power could conquer everything. Utter arrogance has led to greed, selfishness, indulgence in desires, deception…. All these have filled the human heart of the present epoch.

Also, there is a second meaning to the “stolen world”: with the arrival of the Last Judgment, the Lord comes “as a thief in the night” (1 Thessalonians 5:2~3, Revelation 3:3 & 16:15). Hence, DU said, “my works attempt to depict the scenes on the day of this world being stolen by the ‘thief.’ However, the work of God is bound to exceed human imagination, and all I can do is to get close to it, inevitably unfinished. I hope the works on show will awake all the people: Be tentative to the natural disasters so frequent in recent years and seek the causes at their root; we were born with sins and may die with sins. We ought to learn to be grateful and repent.”

AIDA Makoto, famous contemporary Japanese artist, commented on DU:

“[His works] are wonderful, through and through!
Frankly, that is my first impression of DU's works.
Perhaps not only DU, but also other graduates from China Central Academy of Fine Arts, who also possess superb fine-art techniques. Perhaps that is a sign of the barely surviving “socialist realism”? Also noteworthy is the interesting blending of such fine-art techniques with today’s computer-aided drawing environment, as if the 19th century had extended its arm through the 20th century to hold hands with the 21th century – a big surprise to a Japanese like me.

Nevertheless, DU is at his best when expressing a unique sense of “horror” in his works. That is a kind of horror sending chills down the spine, in sober silence. That is conveyed not only in his recent works on urban catastrophes, but also earlier works of Qing Dynasty figures. Where does such a concern with horror come from? Is it an idiosyncratic character or national character? – That is the most intriguing part.”
 
With these comments, AIDA Makoto not only summed up the features of DUN Kun’s works, but also highlighted the message and value of his art that may make its way to the circle of international communication at the turn of the second decade of the 21th century.