Who is Fu Luofei? It’s a name that was seldom mentioned in the era of contemporary art, and now he is highlighted by The Shape of Content: Fu Luofei’s Realist Painting and Wartime Art in China which is presented by Taikang Art Museum in Beijing. Fu became the first Chinese artist to participate in the Venice Biennale; he remained inseparable from the brush in his hand, using art as a means of speaking out against suffering; he served as the inaugural president of the Human Art Club...
On view from April 19 to July 5, 2026, the exhibition is the largest retrospective to date dedicated to the life and work of Fu Luofei (1897–1971), and it brings together more than 400 works, including 29 pieces from the Taikang Collection, alongside over 100 rare historical documents, among them a substantial number of previously unpublished manuscripts and archival materials presented to the public for the first time.
Exhibition View of The Shape of Content: Fu Luofei’s Realist Painting and Wartime Art in China
From a coolie drifting through Southeast Asia to an artist studying in Europe
Fu Luofei’s artistic career was marked by extraordinary upheaval. It was at once a legend of a singular life intertwined with painting, and a vivid microhistory of the development of realist painting in China and of art in the early People’s Republic.
Born into a poor fishing family in Hainan, Fu nevertheless became the first Chinese artist to participate in the Venice Biennale. As a youth, he drifted through Southeast Asia in search of a living; in early adulthood, he threw himself into the revolutionary movement; later, he went on to study in Europe. Yet throughout these transformations, he remained inseparable from the brush in his hand, using art as a means of speaking out against suffering.
Fu Luofei, Peasant Woman and Ox, 1940s, Pastel on paper, 59.8 × 66.2 cm, Collection of Guangzhou Museum of Art
Fu Luofei, Master of the Land (Returning from Work), 1940s, Pastel on paper, 108.8 × 78.6 cm, Collection of Guangzhou Museum of Art
Fu Luofei, Returning Herdsmen in the Sunset, 1940s, Ink and color on paper, 67.7 × 35 cm, Collection of Guangzhou Museum of Art
As a member of the early twentieth-century generation of Chinese artists who studied abroad, Fu Luofei’s practice traversed multiple terrains: academic training, wartime experience, and the social reconstruction of modern China. He was not only an introducer of modern artistic language, but also an active builder of modern Chinese art.
Deeply embedded in the historical fabric of twentieth-century China, Fu’s artistic practice, with its dramatic biographical turns, its synthesis of Chinese and Western approaches, and its complex identity combining intellectual self-awareness with revolutionary commitment, offers a vivid case study of the destinies and spiritual choices of his generation within the medium of painting.
Fu Luofei, Self-Portrait, 1942, Ink on paper, 84 × 42 cm, Private collection
Fu Luofei, Self-Portrait, 1946, Pencil on paper, 39 × 28 cm, Collection of Guangdong Museum of Art
Returning to Homeland and Taking Art as His Weapon
Working across ink painting, sketching, cartoons, and oil painting, Fu entered directly into the historical realities of war and displacement after he returned to his homeland in 1938. His works indict social darkness and express a profound concern for the fate of the nation, combining sharpness with emotional and visual force.
With his brush as a weapon, Fu bore witness to the upheavals of wartime China and to the pulse of revolution in the first half of the twentieth century, forging through personal conscience and a deeply expressive touch a modern pictorial language of remarkable originality—one he himself described as “romantic realism.”
Fu Luofei, Marching in a Thunderstorm, 1940s, Oil pastel on paper, 60.5 × 67.5 cm, Private collection
Fu Luofei, Flight (Evacuation Train), 1940s, Pastel on paper, 59.3 × 66 cm, Collection of Guangzhou Museum of Art
Fu Luofei, Screeve, 1946, Pastel on paper, 147.3x82.2cm, Collection of Guangzhou Museum of Art
Fu Luofei, A Comrade's Death, 1940s, Ink on paper, 12 × 18.5 cm, Collection of the artist's family
Fu Luofei, Vendor and Thief, 1940s, Ink on paper, 8 × 13.4 cm, Collection of the artist's family
The exhibition title, The Shape of Content, points both to the forceful rhythm of historical transformation in Fu Luofei’s paintings and to the transformation of artistic language under the pressure of lived reality. In a wartime China of the first half of the twentieth century engulfed by suffering, Fu used his brush to bear witness for refugees and the voiceless, fusing personal destiny with the broader narrative of the nation. His artistic practice endures like an inextinguishable spark, burning through the darkness of its age and illuminating the dignity and ideals of human life.
Fu Luofei, A New Environment, c. 1947, Gouache on paper, 68 × 71.5 cm, Collection of Guangdong Museum of Art
Fu Luofei, Group Activities at the Five-Story Pagoda, 1953, Gouache on paper, 52x67cm, Collection of Guangdong Museum of Art
Fu Luofei, Harvesting Sugarcane, 1962, Gouache on paper, 49.2x68.6cm, Collection of Guangzhou Museum of Art
Fu Luofei, Toppling Mountains and Overturning Seas The Crowd Heading to Work at Wuhan Iron and Steel, 1964, Gouache on paper, 31x64cm, Collection of Guangdong Museum of Art
Shining Stars, the Human Art Club Featuring Left-wing Artists
In 1946, Fu Luofei was elected the first president of the Human Art Club in Hong Kong, a group that, together with its wider circle, brought together some of the most outstanding left-wing artists active in the Nationalist-controlled regions during the war years. Among them were Huang Xinbo, Zhang Guangyu, Ye Qianyu, Pang Xunqin, Liao Bingxiong, Xie Qusheng, Li Hua, Ye Fu, and Huang Yongyu—artists whose practices matured through the experience of the War of Resistance and who collectively helped sustain the backbone of wartime Chinese art.
Colleagues of the Human Art Club and the Human Press (Literature and Fine Arts), Hong Kong, 1947 Vintage photograph, Collection of Huang Xinbo Personal Archive (Back row, left to right: Liang Yongtai, Lao Muduan, Chen Shi, Jin Fan, Yang Jing, Lu Wuya; front row, left to right: Chen Yutian, Huang Xinbo, Hua Jia, Chen Baochang)
Ding Cong, The True Story of Ah Q (selected page),1944, Black-and-white woodcut on paper, 15.6 × 12.5 cm, Private collection
Li Hua, Angry Tide Series (selected page), 1947, Black-and-white woodcut on paper, 19x26.5cm, Private collection
More than a survey of Fu Luofei’s artistic practice, the exhibition also seeks to reconstruct the development of left-wing art in the 1940s through key works related to wartime Chinese art and the Human Art Club (Renjian Huahui), thereby helping to recover a “missing piece” in the study of modern Chinese art history.
Situ Qiao, Father and Daughter, 1946, Watercolor on paper, 35.4 × 26.4 cm, Collection of Guangzhou Museum of Art
Huang Xinbo, Heroes on Hero Road—The Builders of Stilwell Road, 1945, Colored charcoal on paper, 29.3 × 38.2 cm, Collection of Huang Xinbo Personal Archive
Huang Yongyu, Telling Stories, 1946, Black-and-white woodcut on paper,14.3×19cm, Private collection
Ye Qianyu, Escaping from Hong Kong (selected pages), 1941, Ink and color on paper, 27.5.×22cm, Private collection 
Ye Fu, Untitled, 1948, Black-and-white woodcut on paper, 16.5x23.6cm, Collection of Zheng Ziyan
Zhang Guangyu, Journey to the West: A Comic Strip (selected page), 1945, Ink and color on paper, 37x26cm, Collection of Zhang Guangyu Art Archieve Center
Zhang Xiya, News of Spring, 1940s, Black-and-white woodcut on paper, 18.5 × 14 cm, Private collection
Pang Xunqin, Untitled (Scholar’s Children, Stricken), 1945, Watercolor on paper, 65 × 45 cm, Private collection
Xie Qusheng, Summoning of Souls (selected pages), 1946, Ink and color on paper, 29 × 33 cm, Private collection
What this exhibition presents is not merely a material gathering of original works and documents, but also the difficult footsteps of an era, the artistic aspirations of a generation, and the resilient growth of realist art, holding both historical value and artistic research value. The exhibition is organized into seven sections: Pastoral, Roar, China!, The Starving People, Constellation: Renjian Huahui (The Human Art Club) and Wartime Art in China, But the World Has Changed!, Self-Portraits, and South of the Sea. Together, these sections offer a multidimensional view of how Fu Luofei’s lived experience and the historical conditions of his time shaped the themes and stylistic development of his art. Open to the public free of charge, the exhibition is accompanied by a rich program of academic events, including lectures, workshops, and symposia, bringing together professionals from the fields of art, scholarship, and museum studies in China and abroad for sustained intellectual exchange.
Exhibition View of The Shape of Content: Fu Luofei’s Realist Painting and Wartime Art in China
Whether scholars and researchers with a deep interest in wartime art and the ecology of left-wing artistic practice in the first half of the twentieth century, those who lived through and still feel a profound resonance with that turbulent era, young visitors who come to the museum in search of inspiration, children encountering history with curiosity, or culturally engaged audiences attuned to the emotional currents of their time through art— every visitor who enters the exhibition will find an opportunity to enter into dialogue with history, to reflect through art, and to draw from it a vitality that remains powerfully alive across time: an enduring passion and critical spirit that continue to reside in the human world.
About the Exhibition
The Shape of Content: Fu Luofei’s Realist Painting and Wartime Art in China
Organizer: Taikang Art Museum
Date: April 19th-July 5th, 2026
Venue: Taikang Art Museum (1-2F, Taikang Group Building, Building 1, Yard 16, Jinghui Street, Beijing)
Opening Hours: Tues.-Sun. 10:00-17:30 (the latest entry time: 16:30)
Curator: Cai Tao
Participating Artists:
Fu Luofei
Gu Yuan, Yan Han, Ma Da, Zhang Wang, Ji Guisen, Wang Liuqiu, Huang Xinbo, Yang Qiuren, Liao Bingxiong, Zhang Guangyu, Ding Cong, Mi Gu, Shen Tongheng, Te Wei, Zhang Wenyuan, Fang Jing, Zhang Yangxi, Yang Taiyang, Liang Yongtai, Yang Newei, Wang Qi, Huang Yan, Huang Yongyu, Ye Qianyu, Xie Qusheng, Hu Kao, Pang Xunqin, Zhang Leping, Li Hua, Chen Yanqiao, Rong Ge, Shao Keping, Yi Qiong, Zhao Yannian, Wang Maigan, Zhang Xiya, Xin Yi, Wang Renfeng, Zong Qixiang, Situ Qiao, Ye Fu, Toni Ferro, Arthur Rothstein
Exhibition Works Supported by:
Guangdong Museum of Art, Guangzhou Museum of Art, Zhejiang Art Museum, Xie Zilong Photography Museum, School of Humanities, Central Academy of Fine Arts, Taikang Insurance Group, Zhang Guangyu Art Documentation Center, Huang Xinbo Personal Archive, Hong Kong Heritage Museum
Family Members of Fu Luofei, Prominent Private Collectors in Asia, Mr. Liu Zhipeng, Ms. Huang Yuan, Mr. Li Wei, Mr. Chen Wei, Mr. Wang Wei, Mr. Liu Ding / Ms. Lu Yinghua, Mr. Cai Tao, Mr. Deng Ziyang, Ms. Zheng Ziyan, Ms. Liu Ying, Mr. Zhang Guangduo, Mr. Pang Ying, Mr. Tang Minwei
Courtesy of Taikang Art Museum, edited by CAFA ART INFO.
