The name Zeng Fanzhi has entered the pantheon of the most gifted, admired and most readily recognized of Chinese contemporary artists. Along with Zhang Xiaogang, Yue Minjuin and Liu Xiaodong, Zeng regularly competes to hold the record for the highest price in auction for a contemporary Chinese work of art. His unique and individualistic style is as immediately recognizable as the iconic works of Zhang Xiaogang, Yue Minjuin, Wang Guangyi and Cai Guoqiang. However, where these artists have become famous for a particular theme, motif, symbolism or technique, Zeng has become most respected and admired for the development in his oeuvre of his various themes and concepts along with the development of his painting techniques particularly his spectacular use of the brush in his masterful strokes.

Even before his first arrival in Beijing in 1993 from Wuhan in Hubei Province where he was born in 1964, Zeng Fanzhi was recognized as an innovative, unique and important voice in the Chinese contemporary art world. His works were immediately included in all major group exhibitions of the new emerging contemporary art both in China and overseas, and he was soon holding extensive solo exhibitions both at home and abroad. In 1992, his works were included in the Guangzhou Biennial - Oil Painting of the Nineties, and then in 1994 he took part in the "Exhibition of Works Selected by Art Critics" in the China Art Gallery in Beijing. Also in 1993/1994 his works were included in the major exhibition "New Art from China" in Marlborough Fine Arts in London. His presence in this exhibition announced to the world at large the arrival of a powerful new artistic voice and visionary. In 1995 his works were included in "Beyond Ideology: New Art from China", Haus der Kulturen der Welt, Hamburg, Germany, and in Barcelona, Spain, "Out of the Middle Kingdom: Chinese Avant-Garde Art", Santa Monica Arts Centre. Then in 1996 his works were included in many exhibitions at home and abroad, including "The First Academic Exhibition of Chinese Art" China Art Gallery, Beijing; and Hong Kong Arts Centre, Hong Kong, and "China! Touring Exhibition", Kuntsmuseum, Bonn, Germany. Zeng's central position in contemporary Chinese art has ensured his works are included in every major exhibition of Chinese contemporary art, the most recent being "The World Belongs to You", Palazzo Grassi, Italy in 2011.

His first solo exhibition was in his hometown of Wuhan in 1990, "Zeng Fanzhi", Hubei Institute of Fine Arts Gallery, Wuhan. A major solo exhibition 'Behind the Mask' was held in 1995 at the Hanzart TZ Gallery in Hong Kong. In 1998, "Zeng Fanzhi: The Mask Series", took place at ShanghART Gallery, Shanghai while Zeng Fanzhi Works 1993-1998, was held at the Central Academy of Fine Arts Gallery, Beijing. His first solo overseas exhibitions took place in 2004, "Unmask the Mask – Zeng Fanzhi", Artside Gallery, Korea, and "Face", at Soobin Gallery Singapore. More exhibitions followed in New York, London, Barcelona, Paris as well as in every major city in China. In 2010, Zeng was the first Chinese Artist to have a solo exhibition in the former Eastern Bloc of Europe when Zeng Fanzhi was held at The National Gallery of Foreign Art, in Sofia, Bulgaria.

One of the major themes of Zeng's body of work is alienation, disconnectedness, solitude, and loneliness in a strange and frightening world, and as a contemporary Chinese artist Zeng stands alone as an exemplar of the individualistic artist allowing his innermost thoughts and creativity pour directly onto the canvas. Unlike most of his contemporaries who have chosen such genres as Political Pop, or Cynical Realism, wherein they explore present day Chinese society, Zeng has always focused on the individual, his psychology, and his angst in a threatening and frightening world. Traditionally Chinese art is representational, focusing on nature and the outside world, and almost never putting an individual or person to the forefront, indeed there is little history of representational portraits. Zeng's focus on the psychological, emotional and mental state of the human person is unique in Chinese art.

As a small boy growing up in Wuhan in the 1960s and 1970s, Zeng's sensitive nature was encroached upon by the chaotic times he lived through. The Cultural Revolution was in full swing and chaos swarmed everywhere. This was to leave a lasting impression on his psychology, as well as to provide many of the central themes of his later works. Even his most iconic series "The Mask" series may have its origins from this time as most people just to survive the unrest had to play roles and hide their true selves. Zeng was considered a poor student, and suffered accordingly even being thrown out of class at one point in Middle School. The sense of alienation he experienced has permeated his art ever since. But Zeng was also a stubborn youngster and refused to wear the traditional red neck scarf of the revolutionary youth movement further adding to his sense of angst and disconnectedness. He was good at art and in the early 1980s he painted all his unrealized dreams, with themes of success, achievement, order and respect, all things missing from his childhood experiences.

He entered the Oil Painting Department of the Hubei Institute of Fine Arts where he encountered German Expressionism. This was to have a profound effect on him and deeply influence his art. He found the means and way to express his innermost feelings and experiences adopting the techniques and colors of this major European art movement while making his expression totally his own. For Zeng art has always been an emotional experience and he has commented on his works as "I have no choice, because I just love painting. My works are the expression methods I am good at and they are the best way of expressing my life. This has been so ever since I started painting: I draw and paint as I like." His first two series of works "Hospital" and "Meat" were born of his childhood experiences. However, it was expressionism which gave him the means to explore those terrifying subjective experiences and through distortion and the use of strong fleshy colors recreate on canvas the turmoil of his mind.

On moving to Beijing Zeng created a new series, the "Mask" series for which he has become most famous. Young sophisticated urbanites are portrayed wearing masks, hiding their true selves amid the nothingness and boredom of their lives. In the late 90's he then created his "Figures" series in which isolated characters are portrayed suspended in emptiness with wry expressions indicative of Zeng's own feelings. This was followed by his "Human Portrait" series. Zeng has said of his progressive series "Sometimes, change is indeed subconscious. I never announce to the world that I am going to change myself. Actually, I've been painting with my own thoughts, which do not allow me to repeat what I've done before."

Our present magnificent work comes from one of his latest series the "Grass" series. Wild, dark grasses seem to take on a life of their own as they scrawl menacingly around the canvas. Bedded on a dark hillside, and portrayed in flat dark colors, the grasses seem to imbue the scene with a dynamic energy, and visual tension. At first appearing distorted and alarming we are reluctantly drawn into the scene and soon experience with Zeng the inner workings of his mind. The round hill evokes images of the brain while the strong and chaotic grasses are expressions of the deep turmoil going on deep within our psychology and are almost like the pulsating thoughts firing wildly in a disturbed mind. Although dominated by blacks and grays, the picture is not one of total despair, instead it offers hope and the possibility of redemption. Stripes of blues, greens, and reds, appear in the grasses as if positive thoughts can break through the chaotic scrambling mind. The hill and grasses are surrounded by the bright white light of the sky as the sun sets, and Zeng at this point in his life may be suggesting that while the inner world is dark and foreboding, the outside world is not so frightening after all.

Zeng's masterful brush strokes add to the heightened sense of power and emotion. They are indicative of his free flowing and subconscious painting style, allowing his moods and emotions to flow onto the canvas. Zeng uses two brushes held in one hand between different fingers to create his chaotic, wild strokes. Just as with a pair of chopsticks, one brush is held firmly with three fingers while the second one moves freely between two fingers. The first one creates deliberate thought out strokes, the second follow, freely creating whatever lines it wants. The first stroke is like our conscious, controlled thoughts, the second stroke like our wild, uncontrolled emotions allowing Zeng to create an abstract landscape of our inner psychological state.

Zeng's brush technique has created a new representational language combining the logical and irrational. The logical mind sits side by side with the unconscious, intuitive and emotional mind, just as the two brushes sit side by side in the hand. The deep linear marks stroked into the surface of the painting draw attention to the surface of the painting and the chaotic nature of the grasses. This is highly reminiscent of the abstract calligraphic representational techniques of ancient Chinese art.