(Liberty Times, by reporter Ling Mei-hsueh) Lo Chan Peng, a Taiwanese contemporary artist who has drawn international attention within the field of traditional painting, has in recent years won acclaim for both the art and the market standing of his work. His portraits are finely realist and consummate in craft, yet never merely skilful: each stroke traces the movement of an inner spirit, holding the viewer in a strong, exacting gaze. Working in oil and ink, he has long examined questions of time, history, life and death.

A graduate of the Western Painting programme at the National Taiwan Normal University Graduate Institute of Fine Arts, Lo has received the Union Art New Artist Award (2004), the Chi Mei Art Award (2007) and the Kaohsiung Art Award (2008). In 2020 he was given the Purchase Award, a Portraiture Honourable Mention and the People’s Choice Award by the Art Renewal Center (ARC), USA, and was named among the Portrait Society of America’s top fifty in its 22nd International Portrait Competition. The Purchase Award work, Les Fleurs du mal (oil on canvas, 63 × 63 cm, 2020), was shown from 16 to 26 July in the 15th International ARC Salon at Sotheby’s New York.