He seldom appears at exhibitions where his peers invariably are networking hard, so it was something of a surprise to see him and his work at the 2008 Art Shanghai last weekend.

Some might think He is self-centered, withdrawn and hard to approach, but he was a surprise. Dressed in casual but stylish clothes, He looked much younger in the flesh than his real age.

"Don't look at me as if I were a monster," he tells Shanghai Daily. "I am just a lazy man who loves to follow the calling in his heart."

Born into an intellectual family, He has five older brothers and sisters. "My family pampered me a lot," he admits. "Perhaps that's why I am so free to do what I want."

One of his older brothers is He Xuntian, the internationally renowned composer of "Sister Drum," an album of New Age music that proved so popular it became the first Chinese music album to be released worldwide.

"I hate to be introduced to others as the younger brother of He Xuntian," he says. "We are in two totally different areas and I don't think my art talent is inferior to his music talent."

He says that when he was a child, his parents wanted him to play the violin. Instead, the boy picked up a brush and became a painter of such talent he was admitted to the Sichuan Academy of Fine Arts, one of the top art academies in the country.

"When I was at the academy, there was no access to Western art," he says. "Can you imagine, we had to wait in line for merely a glance at a catalogue of a Western artist when it was put in a glass case at the library?"

Upon graduation, He was assigned to paint stage designs for a local singing and dancing troupe.

"But my idea was perhaps too modern, and the director of the troupe couldn't accept it," he says. "I had to realize my art dream through another avenue in my paintings."

He's canvases are filled with dramatic feeling enhanced by his choice of simple, light colors - mostly gray, black and white - with only occasional bright hues. The brushstrokes are uncomplicated, reminiscent of the flowing lines seen in traditional Chinese ink-wash paintings.

"Visually, they are not dynamic," he explains, "but viewers might experience the subtle meaning that echoes with their own situation."