Lu Hong was born in 1959, in Qin Huangdao, a city on the coast of northeastern China. He graduated high school in 1981 when his uncle Ting Shao Kuang helped him to realize his dream. Kuang was one of the leaders of already internationally-known Chinese art movement of the Yunnan School.

Kuang, also persecuted by the communist authorities, he eventually left the country and asked Hong to join him in 1986. Lu Hong was influenced by the works of Paul Klee, Modigliani, and Picasso. He listened to the classical music of Chopin, Mueller and Wagner. He also was able to read books on poetry, Western literature and psychology. Lu Hong relates, "All my life I was forced to think and act a certain way, but after I left the academy, I began to develop my own style of thinking and painting."

Hong is best known for his multi-faceted paintings on rice paper, a very delicate technique that includes the use of different water-based mediums, as watercolor and gouache, Japanese mineral and Chinese stone paints. His cautiously applied lines form drawing on rice paper sheets that are affiliated with liquid acrylic and placed on the painting board.

Lu Hong has become one of the most acclaimed contemporary Chinese artists in America.