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Chinese writer Hai Ya’s The Space-Time Painter won the Hugo Award (雨果奖) for Best Novelette (中篇小说) in October 2023. He became the third Chinese writer to win a Hugo Award after Liu Cixin in 2015 and Hao Jingfang in 2016.

Hai Ya got the idea of his work from a painting called Qianli Jiangshan Tu. Wang Ximeng from the Song Dynasty painted the work at the age of 18.

Modeled on (以……为原型) the life of Wang, Hai Ya created the character of an excellent painter Zhao Ximeng. Zhao painted for an emperor more than 1,000 years ago. One day, the painter’s mind left his physical body and went into a special space. There a modern police officer was working on a case having to do with a very old painting.

The Space-Time Painter tells about the political upheavals (政治动乱) of the time when the painting was created. We can find traditional Chinese culture, history, speculative elements (推理元素) and science fiction in Hai Ya’s work.

Hai, 33, developed an interest in science fiction when he was very young and started writing at university. Now, he works in Shenzhen. “I’m really surprised and very lucky. It’s like a dream come true,” said Hai Ya.