Han Le Ran of Korean nationality was born in Long Jing Village, Yan Ji County, Jilin Province in 1898. He earlier studied in Shanghai Art technological academy and aspired to link life and art with social progress, which developed his revolutionary course to combine life with art. In 1929, Han Le Ran studied in France, then sketched in Netherlands, Belgium, England, Italy, etc and founded solid base of painting. When China fell into danger, he came back home and voluntarily contributed himself into promulgation of anti-Japan and saving nation. He insisted in his oath after countless hardships and made outstanding contribution to the national liberation career.

As an artist Han Le Ran initiated a new way as his splendid achievement in art to discover and express cultural heritage and local customs of Northwest China. From the 40s he travelled around Northwest with his footprints all over Sinkiang, Gansu and Qinhai to portray local customs and pay attention to civil lives. During the period, he went to Dunhuang and Sinkiang twice and initiated his mural copy in western style by oil painting and watercolor painting, made deep investigation on the art of grottoes at the two locations, especially innovation work on the research of Kezier Grotto. During the period the artist created the most concentrated, abundant and plentiful works. These works displayed the specific charming of Chinese traditional art so as to obtain social acknowledge and transmission of grotto as the national cultural treasure; on the other hand, he used arts to portray local conditions and customs of minorities in border lands, developed a new kind of painting subject to clew new painting direction for painting circle. In 1947 when Han Le Ran prepared to make more efforts into archaeology and art with utter purity to save and exert national art, he died in air disaster from Urumqi to Lanzhou.

The review of painting road of Han Le Ran can make us appreciate his true love for the country and his sense of nation and mission and responsibility from heart as an artist who experienced the social turbulences and wars of China in the first half of the 20th century. With plenty of sensitive and passionate works we can see the innovative sparkles and affection for life of the artist under the collision of Chinese and western arts. The grotto murals he copied delivered the verve and demeanor of Chinese classic arts; the scenes and architectures he portrayed transmitted cultural atmosphere and simple and lively style contained in western views; he is also the bosom friend of labor people of all nationalities in northwest China with simple art language to portray the life picture of nationalities from cultivation, watering to horse race and dances. His works sang for life, committed sympathies for life and expressed thick cultural emotions. It can be said that the historical significance and realism from the paintings of Han Le Ran represented the progressive art tide in the first half of the 20th century, which brought deep influences on subsequent Chinese arts. Until now we can still gain benefits from them in different levels such as spirit, concept and language, etc.

For generous donation of his relatives, National Art Museum of China collected and preserved large numbers of magnum opus composed by Han Le Ran. For the great artist, we yearn for him deeply from heart and intent to make his art gain broader transmission and deeper research. In recent years National Art Museum held exhibitions of his works in Guan Shanyue Art Museum (Shenzhen), Macau Museum of Art, and National Museum of Contemporary Art (Korea), which created wide influences. This exhibition will share again most works of Han Le Ran collected by NAMOC with viewers in order to memory the outstanding artist.

Duration: 2011.06.04To 2011.06.12

Venue: National Art Museum of China