The exhibition has selected over 30 refined works from various art institutes and collectors, which will reflect the artist’s growth from the 1990s to the present. From April 23 to June 1, American Shen Kuiyi, Professor of Art History at the University of California, San Diego, will organize another exhibition at the Beijing Center for the Arts, which will share new explorations and inspirations from Li Huayi’s works. The opening day (April 23) will host a forum participated in by dozens of notable experts, scholars, and artists, both domestic and international, who will conduct exchanges in regard to the relationship between traditional and contemporary Chinese paintings. The forum is sure to create a new dimension of thinking that will be useful for the development of Chinese art in the coming 10 years.

Different than other contemporary Chinese artists who choose to face reality head on, Li Huayi is represents another school of artistic thought, opting for a more traditional perspective. In his early life, Li Huayi studied both the techniques and styles of Chinese classical paintings from his school master in Shanghai. He also received strict training in European painting, and has long been exposed to the reality of the contemporary development of the western arts. He draws inspiration from the landscape paintings of the Song Dynasty, and, at the same time, is able to liberate his works from fixed patterns, endowing his works with both a classical flavor which is characteristic of the height of traditional Chinese painting and a contemporary Chinese aesthetic value. In the past two decades, Li’s works have been listed in a number of major museums, including The Metropolitan Museum of Art (New York), Asian Art Museum of San Francisco, Museum of Fine Arts (Boston), Harvard Art Museum, Tokyo National Museum, etc, as having high antique value. Yahoo founder Yang Zhiyuan is also a collector of Li’s works.