Programme Overview

Chinese Figure Painting is one of the founding core programmes of China Academy of Art and a key component of the university's top-tier Fine Arts discipline. It has produced generations of distinguished artists and boasts a continuous academic lineage, profound historical heritage and extensive social influence. Its curriculum includes sketching, copying, meticulous live sketching, freehand live sketching, field practice and graduation creation. Centered on depicting people and contemporary life, the major balances classical heritage and innovative creation. It serves as a vital teaching and research hub for traditional Chinese painting, nurturing outstanding artists active across the art sector worldwide.

Curriculum Overview

Curriculum Structure

Year 1 delivers broad foundational training to sharpen figure modeling skills, ink sensitivity and humanistic literacy, bridging classical artistic spirits with contemporary aesthetics. Years 2-3 adopt progressive modular teaching across figure modeling, techniques, material practice and creative language, with canonical artworks integrated throughout to reinforce knowledge coherence. Year 4 focuses on graduation creation and academic writing, guiding students to produce figure paintings that integrate traditional erudition, global vision and personal artistic style.