Born in 1907 in Xuzhou in Jiangsu Province, Li Keran showed his talent for fine art at an early age and received early training in traditional Chinese painting from teachers at a private school.
In 1923, he received basic training in Western art at Shanghai Art College. Two years later, he taught at Xuzhou Art College. In 1929, he enrolled at the post-graduate class of Hangzhou West Lake Art College, studying Western painting from master painter Lin Fengmian (1900-91).
In 1943, Li worked as an art teacher in Chongqing Art College.
In 1946, he accepted an offer from Xu Beihong (1895-1953) to work as an assistant professor of traditional Chinese painting at Peking Art College.
During that period of time, he continued to learn traditional Chinese painting from Qi Baishi and Huang Binhong.
The solid training and rich experiences of different art trends in different eras contributed to Li's success as a landscape painter of unique style.
However, Li often likened himself to a hardworking Chinese buffalo and named his painting studio as "The Study of a Buffalo Student."
A typical traditional Chinese ink painting includes not only painted images but also quotations of poems, famous lines, signatures, time of the completion of the work and seals.
Li was strict with the details of his art. He often spent many days, even months to perfect a certain technique that would then be used to the desired effect he wanted in his paintings.
He often asked his students to improve themselves not only in painting but also in history, literature, Chinese calligraphy and seal-cutting skills.
Li placed much emphasis on the importance of hard work for the success of a Chinese painter. And he said it is a must-be routine practice for a landscape artist to do extensive outdoor sketches.
"Doing sketches is the essential, basic training for any Chinese landscape painter, because it is no easy job for either a beginner or a veteran artist to grasp beauty of the nature," Li once told his students.
And he himself set a splendid example.
Between 1954 and 1965, Li traveled extensively across the provinces of southern China sketching nature. In 1957, he also spent four months in Germany where he visited museums, cathedrals, made outdoor sketches, and with well-honed skills, depicted Western cityscapes in the form of Chinese ink painting. "Making sketches from nature is by no means recording what you see exactly as it is, because we have the camera to do that job," he once said.
In Li's view, the purpose of outdoor sketching is for the artist to learn from nature, which is even more important than drawing from the traditions of Chinese landscape painting.
Due to his hard work, he lost three of his toes after surgery in the 1970s.
"After carefully studying Li's sketches from nature and his thoughts on sketches and the relationship between natural beauty and artistic representation, I have come to see that, as an innovative artist, Li values Mother Nature even more than centuries-old traditions," said Liu Xilin. Observant viewers attending the exhibition may find similarities between some of the 60-plus sketches and some of his completed landscape paintings on show.
"Very often, the final works are done on the basis of several sketches, because he always tries to put into one picture the very best tone, composition, light and shadow and coloring he can figure out," said his son Li Xiaoke.
During the "cultural revolution" (1966-76), Li suffered from the political upheaval and was forced to stop painting. But he managed to practice in secrecy, improving his skills in traditional Chinese calligraphic art that he later applied to his modern Chinese landscape paintings.
Li's achievements in landscape painting and research into traditional Chinese culture make his works a valuable heritage for this and future generations, said Feng Yuan, curator of the National Art Museum of China.
(China Daily May 13, 2005)
