She believes it is her curiosity about the world around her and the eternal pursuit of beauty that keep her young.

"I like to know what young people are interested in and love to understand the new world," she said. Besides painting and calligraphy, she is also fond of movies, music and anything in which she can find aesthetic value.

"There is a general law in all forms of art," she said, "and the emotion or feeling in appreciating other forms of art gives me great inspiration."

Rich experience

In 1925, Tseng was born to an educated and modern-thinking family in Beijing. Since childhood, she had been captivated by the joy of writing and painting. At 17, she graduated from the Art Department of Furen University in Beijing, a Catholic higher education institution founded in 1925. It was there that she learned traditional Chinese painting and calligraphy from masters such as Qi Gong and Rong Geng. After graduation, she worked as an assistant to Professor Gustav Ecke, an art historian, who later became her husband.

Professor Ecke was the first person to introduce China's Ming Dynasty (1368-1644) furniture to the rest of the world. His book Chinese Domestic Furniture in Photographs and Measured Drawings, written in 1944, still carries weight in today's research on China's Ming Dynasty furniture.

In 1949, Tseng and her husband left China to live in Hawaii. She received her master's degree in arts at the University of Hawaii, and then a PhD from the Fine Arts Institute of New York University.

Tseng has devoted her whole life to art and education. From 1969 to 1998, she worked as a professor at the University of Hawaii, teaching Chinese painting and the history of Chinese fine arts. She was also appointed assistant curator at the Honolulu Academy of Arts.

She has published many books and catalogs that introduce Chinese art to the West. Among her best-known English publications are Some Contemporary Elements in Chinese Classical Pictorial Art, Chinese Calligraphy, Literati Paintings, Chinese Folk Art and A History of Chinese Calligraphy. When former U.S. President Richard Nixon visited China in 1972, he presented Tseng's book Chinese Calligraphy to late Chinese leader Mao Zedong as a gift.

"China and its culture were unknown to most overseas people, and I was eager to introduce the essence of traditional Chinese culture to my students," Tseng said.

Tseng has been the curator of numerous exhibitions, which introduced Chinese painters to the West. For her contribution in bridging East and West, she has received a string of awards, such as the Living Treasure of Hawaii, and the Outstanding Artist Award by the U.S. governments and various institutes.

Tseng has exhibited her works in many countries and visited all the important art museums in the world, which has greatly enriched her knowledge and understanding of art.

Back home

After residing in the United States for nearly 60 years, Tseng returned to China in 2006. Now she lives in the southeast of Beijing, where she owns her new studio, named Baozhen Ge, after her mother.

"I hope to live the rest of my life in the city where I was born, and it's a decision I made answering the call of home, " Tseng said.

"Although I have lived in the West for a long time, I have not been away from things related with China," Tseng said. "I taught the history of Chinese fine arts and was in charge of works related with China in various museums," she said.

After she came back, she donated seven valuable relics—scented-rosewood furniture of the Ming Dynasty that she and her husband had collected over the years—to the Prince Gong Mansion in Beijing, one of the most ornate royal residences in the city.

Drawing or practicing calligraphy every day, Tseng said she enjoys life in her hometown. "It is good to see my childhood friends and make some new friends in my 80s, " she said.

Currently, Tseng said she is engaged in compiling a catalog that will cover her understanding and experience in painting. She hopes to finish it in one or two years.

Apart from this, she is also planning to arrange and catalog her late husband's research. "Besides the research on ancient furniture, my husband also made a lot of efforts to measure drawings of ancient architecture, such as old towers," she said, "I hope my arrangement of his works will be helpful to today's research in this area."

Spending most of her life overseas, Tseng also cares much about the folk art of China. Believing that folk art is an indispensable part of China's traditional art, Tseng said that the works of craftsmen are artworks that have practical value in people's daily lives. She also said that despite her advanced years she hopes to make a contribution to the development of folk art in her motherland.