Specializing in freehand brushwork figure painting, Wang Qingming (born in 1933) has served her teaching duties at the Department of Traditional Chinese Painting of the Hangzhou-based China Academy of Art for decades. Her published works include Structure Sketching and two editions of Wang Qingming’s Paintings, released respectively in 1993 and 1998.

Wang Qingming started her advanced art study at the Eastern China Campus of Central Academy of Fine Arts (present-day China Academy of Art in Hangzhou) in 1955, learning from such masters as Pan Tianshou (1897-1971), Wu Fuzhi (1900- 1977), Zhu Lesan (1902-1984) and Lu Weizhao (1899-1980). At a time when realism was underlined as a goal of the mainstream art circle, the 1950s saw the rise of a new figure painting artist group representing Zhejiang Province, with the works of Li Zhenjian, Zhou Changgu and Fang Zengxian garnering the attention of the national media. Wang’s artistic style and thoughts are strongly influenced by the styles of the three masters, combining the solidity of Li Zhenjian and the ingenuity and flexibility of Zhou Changgu and Fang Zengxian.

Taking art from the reality of life has always been the most important pursuit in the artistic creation of Wang Qingming. To draw inspiration from real life, she traveled a lot, exploring the country’s remotest places such as the south of Gansu in the northwest, Xishuangbanna in Yunnan in the southwest, Mount Tai in eastern China’s Shandong, and Yili in Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region, where she stayed monthsto observe local lifestyles.

Girls and children are two of the artist’s favorite themes, as can be easily noticed in most of her creations depicting the beautiful moments of ordinary people’s homely life. Many of her works included in her first published art book, such as Springtime Greetings, Lamb, The Tajik, Moonlight Sonata, and Mom’s Baby, extract blessings from daily life routines. The viewer can sense the happiness and content from the face and hair decorations of the girl with a shy smile.

Wang Qingming spares no effort in the depiction of faces, hands and feet. She is a structure master, as can be seen in all her figure works that are full of flesh and blood and freehand flexibility brought to the max.

Most of the works included in the second edition of Wang’s brushwork  collectionre her newer creations that demonstrate a more mature artistic attitude. The new edition is also a better summary of the artist’s achievements and progresses. Her love for children and motherhood is fully expressed in the paintings selected from her newer works, many of which show a bolder use of brushstrokes and a higher level of power and precision.

Whether it is the familiar pleasures of the life of ordinary people or more solemn topics, Wang expresses with noticeable ease. Her newer works include a "heavyweight" series that deals with cultural and political notables including Lu Xun, Soong Chingling, and Bing Xin, each demonstrating the artist’s high attainment in achieving unity of form and spirit.

One of Wang Qingming’s solo exhibitions found its way into Paris. During her visit in Europe many years ago, she took the chance to go to Trier (in the west of Germany), to see the former residence of Karl Marx, and found one of her works she created for the celebration of the 100th birthday of Karl Marx displayed in the residence, much to her surprise. Titled Karl Marx Reading Shakespeare, the painting is just one of the artist’s "exotic" creations, in which she uses Chinese-style brushwork to bring out striking "foreign" details and proves herself a master of facial structures and colors. Layers of ink seem to have worked magic in her works, opening a world full of artistic possibilities.