Beijing-based artist Zeng Jianyong is known for his ink works which often depict a child or a teenager who look quiet and indifferent and whose big, watery eyes gaze forward, evoking in the audience curiosity and sympathy.

He adopts sketchy strokes and a soft color scheme to build the highly personal style. And it helps hide his true personality behind the figures in his ink paintings: He expresses his own feelings of the ever-changing world through those innocent looking faces.

Brush of the Soul, an exhibition now on at Guangzhou's XY Gallery through Dec 15, shows more than 20 paintings, sculptures and installations by Zeng, several of which are for the public viewing for the first time.