The eyes have it

A Korean artist paints celebrity faces to tell stories, reflecting the emotions of their time, the painter's own soul and even the viewer's likely reaction, he tells Deng Zhangyu.

In a society where everyone can easily capture a figure with a cellphone or camera, Korean artist Kang Hyung-koo devotes himself to paintings of portraiture, especially the facial expressions of historical icons. His lifelike renderings make some viewers mistake the figures on canvas with reality.

Kang's first solo exhibition in China, titled Soul With One's Flame, is running in the capital this month. It displays 30 portraits, six of which were created during his one-month stay in Beijing to depict "the Chinese heroes in his mind", including Guan Yu, a well-known general in the Three Kingdoms (AD 220-280) and late Chinese leader Deng Xiaoping.