These paintings are not merely artistic expressions, they embody the deep love of the Academy of Arts & Design, Tsinghua University’s faculty for their motherland.
Wang Tieniu
Professor, Department of Painting, Academy of Arts & Design, Tsinghua University
“The Martyrdom of Yang Jingyu” (2025)
Artist: Wang Tieniu
On February 23, 1940, Yang Jingyu was surrounded by Japanese puppet troops in Mengjiang County (now Jingyu County), Jilin Province, and died a heroic death. The painting captures the final moments of General Yang.
Twenty years ago, Professor Wang Tieniu was commissioned by the Yang Jingyu Martyrs’ Memorial Hall to create an oil painting of the general’s martyrdom. For the 80th anniversary, he revisited the work at the request of the Museum of the War of Chinese People’s Resistance Against Japanese Aggression. This updated version refines the environment, figures, color palette, and technique, intensifying the emotional impact of Yang’s portrayal.
“The Eighth Route Army Crossing the Yellow River” (2005, 200cm × 450cm)
Artists: Wang Tieniu, Wang Junrui
The piece depicts the Eighth Route Army’s crossing at Yichuan Ferry, Hancheng, on August 31, 1937, en route to the frontlines. In summer and autumn 2005, the artists visited the site to study historical accounts and produced three oil sketches in the rain, laying the groundwork for the final composition.
“The Air Battle”
Artists: Wang Tieniu, Wang Junrui
This work captures the fierce aerial combat that symbolized international solidarity in China’s resistance between 1937 and 1940.
These three works are currently exhibited at the Museum of the War of Chinese People’s Resistance Against Japanese Aggression.
Dai Daquan
Professor, Department of Painting, Academy of Arts & Design, Tsinghua University
“Weightier Than Mount Tai” (2012, 450cm × 310cm, black-and-white woodcut)
Artists: Dai Daquan, He Qinling
A personalized yet thematically profound work, the print bears an inscription dedicating it to the artist’s revolutionary forebears, Long March veterans and Communist Party members who fought for national independence. What drove them to risk everything? Dai summarizes it in one word: faith, faith in sacrificing for collective happiness, in lending individual strength to national greatness.”
The image of Mount Tai emerged as a metaphor for countless revolutionaries standing firm. Focusing on wartime Yan’an, the piece depicts mourners at the funeral of Lin Yunan (known as “Zhang Hao”), embodying the Maoist ideal that “to die for the people is weightier than Mount Tai.”
Currently displayed at the National Art Museum of China’s exhibition “People’s Victory: Art Exhibition Commemorating the 80th Anniversary of the Victory in the Chinese People’s War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression and the World Anti-Fascist War.”
Chen Hui
Professor, Department of Painting, Academy of Arts & Design, Tsinghua University
The beacon towers of Taihang Mountains, the Great Wall’s signal fires, and the stone lions of Lugou Bridge symbolize the unyielding spirit of the Chinese people during the war, etching the essence of national resistance into history. These works, rendered in ink-wash language, articulate a distinctly Chinese narrative within historical light and shadow.
“Beacon Tower in the Storm” (2006, 46cm × 60cm)
“Stories from the Cave Dwellings I” (2006, 45cm × 56cm)
“Memories of History” (2014, 69cm × 140cm)
“Years in Taihang” (2015, 156cm × 365cm)
“Lugou Bridge Through Time” (2015, 145cm × 200cm)
“Taihang Through the Ages” (2021, 200cm × 160cm)
