[2] The son of He Kunshan [zh],[3] a wealthy businessman,[a] He gained a familiarity with the arts – including music, painting, and poetry – from a young age.

[c] When the Journal of Current Pictorial was established under Pan Dawei in September 1905, He joined as a cartoonist, producing numerous manhua for the magazine[2] – eight to ten per issue.

[1] For the magazine's inaugural issue, he prepared a short poem espousing its purpose: 時事駛乜你報 有畫就唔同 任你舌敝唇焦唔講得佢咁切痛 任你手拳指畫亦唔顯得佢咁玲瓏 呢個畫報主人心血熱湧 欲把國民喚醒在夢中 Current events found in your newspaper Oh so different with pictures You can't speak with burnt tongue and lips, too great the pain No matter how you draw with your fists, it won't look the same The owner of this pictorial brims with passion Seeking to wake the people from their dreams.

When American delegates – including Secretary of War William Howard Taft – visited Guangzhou in 1905, the Journal of Current Pictorial published several anti-American articles.

He believed that the Chinese opera could be used to cultivate support for the revolutionaries,[2] and in 1906 he had – together with Pan Dawei, Lai Yitao, and Liang Juexian – established the Youshijie Drama Society in Guangzhou for that purpose.

He's early works drew from the realism that marked cartoons in the Dianshizhai Pictorial,[2] an illustrated magazine published as a supplement to the Shen Bao.

[2] The manhua scholar Huang Dade described his work as an awakening, showing that while it is necessary to grasp the essence of realism, an exaggerated or even sloppy presentation can be effective.

Hu Shan of the Hong Kong Asia Pacific Artists Association notes a combination of traditional styles and brushwork with Western concepts of sketching and shading.