"Art is not limited to any particular media. You can use many techniques to express an idea. I use photography because I often have ideas that I think would be lost in the process of painting."

Born 1981, Zhang Peng is an artist based in Beijing, China. Zhang Peng graduated from the Central Academy of Fine Art in Beijing in 2005. He has a background in painting but has increasingly embraced photography.

Zhang Peng's work centres on images of young girls in deceptively innocent settings. He photographs dolls with frozen expressions, against lush ambiguous backgrounds. His photo-based paintings of little girls are striking to behold -  beautiful yet slightly terrifying.

Zhang Peng describes his works as:
"In a broad sense, all of my works demonstrate a kind of oppression. If conditions allow, parents plan a future that they think will be good for their children. If they are not wealthy enough, they hope their children will have a skill and then they force them to develop it. As children grow up, their character is distorted by the inappropriate pressure of their parents and their schools. The appearances of my figures drift between real people and dolls. While the image is aesthetic, I also want to reinforce the strong sense of distortion."

Read more about Zhang Peng on his interview with Art Fairs International.

Born in 1941, Guan Zeju (关则驹) hails from Yangjiang, Guangdong Province in China. He graduated from the Oil Painting Department of the Guangzhou Arts Academy, and continued his studies there in 1978. Guan, who is attached to the Guangzhou Arts Academy, is known for his oil paintings. He currently resides in the United States where he works as a studio artist. He is also a member of the American Society of Portrait Artists and has been awarded the distinction of Honorary Overseas Artist by the Guangdong Art Institute.

Guan Zeju has lived through some of the most tumultuous times in China's five thousand year history. He has become a masterful painter and a great teacher through intense discipline and effort and obviously a great deal of inherent talent. As a teenager, people called him the "painting ox" for his single-minded focus, both in Western and in traditional Chinese modes of expression. Again and again, when he is asked about his experiences, his birth in 1941 in a small village outside of Guangzhou, his formal and informal education and apprenticeships, he returns to the same word in Mandarin, meaning roughly "effort."

Through the Cold War and the Cultural Revolution, Guan continued to paint, whether his surroundings and possessions were, by current standards, lavish or incredibly spartan. His efforts produced some of the finest Social Realist artwork in China, artwork now being understood for its influence on the social and political course of the world's most populous nation. His numerous portraits and murals of Mao Ze Dong, paintings and drawings of ethnic minorities, images exalting the glory of the Han Chinese, collections in the National Museum of China, significant works in the Museums of Nanchang and Henan Provinces, as well as numerous prestigious private collections, stand as important testaments to the times in which he has lived.

Guan began at a very young age with graphite and watercolor as well as traditional Chinese ink. At the age of fifteen, he was recognized as a prodigy and awarded by his junior high school with an exhibition of more than two hundred works of art in at least three media.

Guan Zeju is represented by Weinstein Gallery in San Francisco, USA.

Lu Cong was born in Shanghai, China in 1978. When he was eleven, Lu Cong’s family moved to Muscatine, Iowa where they remain today.

In 2000, after graduating from college, where Lu Cong had studied biology and fine art, he was drawn to Denver’s rising potential, both economically and culturally. It was in Denver that Lu Cong joined the Art Student’s League to continue his passion for drawing and painting. His work was an immediate success. Lu Cong’s large-scale portraits are captivating, and often haunting.

He said in an interview with Colorado Modern, “I think the size and all leads you to the eyes. A lot of artists avoid painting the figure looking straight at the viewer. That’s what I really like to do. That’s why I like to paint. I really like the face. The head, the face is the key to me. I enjoy the figure, but I really like the face.”

Lu Cong continues to work at his studio in Denver, Colorado and has also returned to the university to pursue a Master’s Degree in Social Science and Humanities. He is represented by Gallery 1261.

Read more about Lu Cong's profile and achievements here. 

Shelly Wan is an illustrator from Guang Zhou, China. After graduating from the Guang Zhou Academy of Fine Arts, she attended Art Center College of Design in California as an illustration major. She has worked for Rockstar Games as a concept artist and is now working at Imagi Studio as a Visual Development Artist on the animated feature "Astroboy", coming to theatres 2009.

She's known for winning in the Last Man Standing competition and a place in the Chicks Who Draws Chicks calendar, both held by Conceptart.org.

Interviews of Shelly:
Last Man Standing interview
ImagineFX interview

Arnold Tsang, a.k.a Arnistotle is a 25yr old concept artist from Shanghai, China.

His unique painted style coloring has been highly appreciated by fans and artists alike, and his works can be found gracing various covers on the comic stands. Arnistotle has worked with top talents painting their pieces, including Joe Madureira (all the recent TriLunar Gaming Art, Xin #1 Cover, and ThunderCats Variant cover), J Scott Campbell (Thundercats #0 Cover), Mike Turner (Battle of the Planets #1), Savador LaRocca (Ultimate DD and Elektra), Kevin Lau (Vampi, Xin covers), to name a few. His latest cover pieces are over Chris Bachalo (Ultimate War) and Jim Lee (Gen 13 #5).

Besides a superb painter, Arnistotle is also a talented penciler and inker too, which his work can be seen in Mangaverse Avengers Assemble, Taskmaster #4, and Deadpool #68.

Check out his online tutorial here.