He based his pseudonym on two artists who greatly influenced him, the landscape painter Shitao and writer Lu Xun.
A student of the Chinese traditional painting style guohua, he studied at Dongfang Art College and West China Union University in Chengdu (1934-1940).
[3] He joined the Chinese Communist Party and in 1949 at the first national assembly was elected and executive member of the China Artists Association.
[citation needed] In 1955, Shi Lu travelled to India to supervise the overall art design of a Chinese pavilion at an international expo.
During these travels, he made many sketches of the people he observed developing his technique of Western drawing and Chinese brushwork.