Ma Desheng (Born 1952 in China, lives and works in France) is one of the most captivating artists from China. Ma’s early Stars Period woodblock prints of 1979-1981 publicly confronted and challenged the system. After leaving China to Europe, Ma worked in ink exploring figurative abstraction in his “transcendental bodyscapes” that tread the realms of both painting and calligraphy.

Ma later moved to the US where he was tragically involved in a car accident paralyzing him from the waist down. The years that followed were difficult. He moved back to France and began to paint in acrylic on canvas. Working from a wheelchair, he uses brush extensions to paint his massive canvases.

One of Ma’s subjects, since the Stars years in China, are his Rock painting series. Ma explains, “rocks existed before humans.” Ma’s rocks take on a multitude of ideas - balance and harmony alongside the difficulty in movement. They feel almost human yet clumsy, light yet heavy. They express the human condition and his deep underlying philosophies.

Ma Desheng's artworks are collected by the M+ Museum, Hong Kong; the Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris; The British Museum, London; Museum Cernuschi, Paris; Musée d’Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris; l’Association du Museum d’Art Contemporaine de Chamalières, France; Museum of Oxford, Oxford; Museum de Melun, France, Asian Art Museum, Nice, among others.