Wu Guanzhong was born in 1919 in Yixing, Jiangsu Province, China, graduated from Chongqing national art college in 1942 and stayed as a teacher. He travelled to Paris to study at the École Nationale Supérieure des Beaux-Arts in 1947. His time in France inspired him. He returned to China in 1950 and started to teach and work in several universities, including China Central Academy of Fine Arts and Tsinghua University. He is known for works that combined traditional Eastern ink wash drawing with Western oil painting.