Dalu Zhao, Beijing-born artist, worked during the Cultural Revolution in Heilongjiang Province, like his countryman Jiawei Shen. After studying at the Beijing Film Institute, he became Professor of the Department of Fine Arts at the Capital Normal University in 1985. Throughout the 1980s and 1990s he exhibited oil paintings in group shows at the China National Art Gallery, in Singapore and in Rome. A book of his works, Oil Paintings of the Human Body by Dalu Zhao was published in 1988; the volume was followed by A Collection of Oil Paintings of Dalu Zhao (1991) and Zhao Dalu - Oil Paintings (1997). In 1990, 1991 and 1993 he held solo shows in Rome, and by the mid-1990s he was included in the Who's Who of Chinese Artists. In 2001, he moved to Australia, where he now lives in Sans Souci. After success in the Archibald of 2003 with this portrait of Fitzgerald, the following year he was a finalist with Stage Life-John Clark. In 2004 his Art Student was a finalist in the Doug Moran Prize.
