DON LI was born in a small city in southern China and grew up among artists, singers, dancers, musicians and writers. His own talent emerged at age 3 when he was seen scratching sketches of a rooster and duck in the dirt with a stick. Encouraged by others, he was given basic art supplies and began to draw daily. As a teenager, he entered competitions and exhibitions and took formal classes, and he would often ride his bicycle into the countryside for plein air outings with his classmates. Later, he was accepted into the prestigious Central Academy of Arts and Design where he learned mural painting and sculptural art. After graduation, he worked as a muralist on various buildings and also freelanced as a graphic artist. He also became a member of the Chinese Sculpting Association. 

Don's subject matter includes portraiture and figurative art as well as landscapes, in media as varied as oils, acrylics, scratched board, color pencil, ink, and copper.

After he became a father, he found that children gave him new inspiration as an artist. He saw how children occupy their own emotional world of solitude and introspection, a sort of dream land and soul world that artists themselves often try to escape into. It is that interior life that he seeks to convey through his art.

Don is enamoured with classical music. He thinks of music as paintings in fluid form and of paintings as music in crystallized form. As a painter, his goal is to lead the viewer into a world that is pure, peaceful, aesthetic and harmonious.