SHENZHEN may be encouraging animation and digital art, but many artists are still putting ink on rice paper to express themselves.

Showcasing the development of traditional Chinese ink painting in a contemporary context, "The Development of Traditions" is now on exhibit at the He Xiangning Art Museum.

The show includes about 100 recent works by 17 artists from the country's major cities including Beijing, Shanghai, Nanjing, Hangzhou, Changsha, Lanzhou and Guangzhou.

The show was curated by independent curators Lu Peng, Shao Hong and Yan Shanchun from Beijing and Shenzhen.

"Whatever differences may lie between our life experiences and those of our ancestors, our innermost feelings still remain the same as those of ancient painters," Lu said.

"This may explain why so many artists today still use traditional media such as brushes and rice paper to express their feelings, and the differences between individual artists only lie in how they use these traditional media," Lu said.

Fu Xiaodong, a 28-year-old painter from Liaoning Province, uses techniques of traditional Chinese landscape painting to depict the urban landscape and industrialization.

Zou Jianping, 41, from Hunan Province, is known for his Chinese figure paintings. Here he's depicting female beauty with techniques from Western oil painting.

Editor: Wing