Deeper Understanding of Society: The Necessary Preparation and Training for Art to “Enter the World”—Li Hua’s Tortuous Artistic Quest in the Republican Era

Li Hua was a leading figure of Chinese printmaking in the mid-20th century, an artist who demonstrated remarkable resilience amidst historical turbulence. The lecture will discuss how Li Hua, facing personal loss and national crisis in the 1930s and 40s, tenaciously explored new paths in printmaking. It will examine his late-1930s reflection on the internal dilemmas of the New Woodcut Movement and his search for new possibilities in social perspective, life experience, and expressive techniques. The talk will address the difficulties and setbacks he encountered, and how he achieved breakthroughs and progress in the mid-1940s and 1950s.