思想性、艺术性于一炉的代表作《山乡巨变》，被称为是中国连环画史上里程碑式的杰作，并于1963年在文化部与中国美术家协会举办的全国第一届连环画评奖会上获一等奖，从而形成了自己独特的艺术风格,获得了美术界的高度评价。
浙江省连环画专业委员会副主任、常山县八届政协委员曾令兵，把做生意赚来的500多万元钱全部投入到了“小人书”收藏，并办起了“民间连环画博物馆”。在收藏的3万册连环画中，曾令兵最为得意且悉心珍藏的就是贺友直创作的那套《山乡巨变》连环画。
著名连环画家贺友直的代表作还有《白光》《朝阳沟》《连升三级》《十五贯》《小二黑结婚》《申江风情录》等。《白光》获第二届全国连环画绘画一等奖；《十五贯》《朝阳沟》《皮九辣子》等均获全国奖。他出版专著《贺友直谈连环画创作》后,《贺友直短篇连环画选集》《贺友直画自己》《中国连环画名家经典—贺友直画作》相继在京沪等地出版。
贺友直连环画作品享誉海内外，一些代表作曾到英、法等国展览。画家还应邀在新加坡南洋艺术学院、法国昂古莱姆图像学院授课，并获法国昂古莱姆市荣誉市民证书。他的形象和代表作品中的人物，被制成地砖铺在法国昂古莱姆市法国国家连环画和图像中心的广场上。在我国众多有成就的画家中，他是唯一获得此项荣誉的。1980年中央美术学院成立连环画年画系时，特聘贺友直兼任教授。
他曾在法国、德国、新加坡举办个人画展，作品还在英国、挪威、瑞士、韩国等地展出。
“中国美术奖”是中宣部批准设立，文化部、中国文联、中国美协主办，并由中国美协承办的国家级美术最高奖。贺友直获首届“中国美术奖·终身成就奖”，作品被中国美术馆、上海美术馆、广州美术馆收藏。
连环画这一画种具有特别大的包容量，其功能则是通过连延不断的画面来“讲故事”。贺友直在创作中自觉地探索规律。他摸索到：作为画故事的画家，必须学会“做戏”。所谓做戏，就是胸怀故事全局，挖掘人物内在的性格冲突，选取和捕捉生活中富有表现力的可视形象。
在《李双双》中，丈夫喜旺和双双闹矛盾，离家一个多月才回来，以劈柴表示内疚想求得老婆原谅。双双回家看到，知道他是以此道歉，就说：“家不会开除你。”如何将这句文学语言转化为绘画语言，显然不容易。这句话怎么画？贺老想到了一串钥匙，让李双双将钥匙交给小孩，叫小孩递给爹，说明“你可以进家门了”。钥匙作为一种家的象征，一种绘画符号，很自然就形成了画面，入情入理。这就是“通过看得见的，表现看不见的”。
贺友直的创作表明，他的“做戏”，既富有情趣，又真实可信。打开长达396幅的《山乡巨变》，那些生活在富有浓郁地方特色的湖南山乡的人们，在农业合作化运动中的一言一行、一举一动，被描绘得妙趣横生，真切自然。这一切说明，画家从生活出发来“做戏”的创作方法是正确而高明的。
对于艺术与生活和画技的关系，贺友直常说：“画连环画绝不是技术性不强、艺术性不高的事情，它的画幅虽小，但天地很大，是要下功夫研究的。”贺友直的艺术成就在于用他那活灵活现、富有生命力的白描形式把现实生活与古老的中国传统画神话般地结合得尽善尽美，同时将通俗的连环画开拓出新的天地。他的新作《小街世相》图，还是用精当圆熟的白描手法创作。欣赏此图，仿佛引领着我们穿越时空的隧道，返至半个多世纪以前的上海滩。当年申城那种感觉、那种气息扑面而来，准确而生动，堪称可与《清明上河图》前后映照的新画卷。
乡情绵绵无尽期
贺友直非常思念家乡的乡亲与儿时的生活。贺友直自幼丧母，由乡下姑妈抚养，在宁波大碶王隘一个小学入学，后转至新碶小学续学。当时的新碶小学设在一个关帝庙里，庙里有个斑驳脱落的戏台，戏台四周隐隐约约地显现出《三国演义》的绘画。他被那传神的绘画迷住了，一次次细心地描摹、比照、思索、修改，凭着这些无师自通的绘图实践，他的美术课成绩居然在小学生中遥遥领先。
贺友直常说，家乡的山水养育了我，家乡的童年生活是我取之不尽的创作源泉。在沪上闯荡了60多年后，老人思念养育他的故乡。他在家乡的原祖基旁新置了一处住房，经常从上海返回家乡走走看看，与家乡的父老乡亲相见、叙旧。2003年底,贺友直根据儿时记忆，为家乡创作了《新碶老街风情录》组画，并将原作捐赠给宁波北仑博物馆。《新碶老街风情录》所表现的家乡景物全凭贺友直对少年时代生活的回忆，老人对家乡的感情和清晰的记忆，让许多人惊叹不已！
2010年春天，中国美院举办的“漫画创作EMBA班—2010国家原创动漫高级研修班”上，作为浙籍名人、连环画大师，88岁的贺老受邀前来讲学。他怀着浓浓的乡情，为来自国内高校动画专业的教师、动画企业创作精英讲述自己的绘画经验与创作感悟。他说：“画家一生要解决两个问题：画什么？怎么画？”“搞艺术的人，一定要有悟性，不然就开不了窍。人的素质最基本的东西就是认真，做事认真,终归会成功。”
他说到《清明上河图》：“中国人有自己的艺术欣赏习惯，喜欢看故事情节。《清明上河图》就是这样，有看头。一条街，一个摊，一个门，门里头还有东西；一个窗，窗里头还有玩意……这些应该得到尊重和继承，它和技法是一致的东西。”
2010年10月28日，贺老将他的工作室搬回故乡。“贺友直工作室”在宁波北仑区新碶街道西街3号成立。这个工作室的设立,正是老画家对家乡文化工作的支持与反哺。工作室重点是对少年儿童进行绘画培训。
一手持笔，一手把酒，笑对人生
生活中的贺老，达观开朗，率性诙谐。他极富睿智的话语，常使人回味良久后忍俊不禁，抚掌称绝。每天晚餐是他最放松的愜意时光，品着老夫人烹饪的美味菜肴，喝着绍兴的加饭酒，眼睛有一搭没一搭地瞅着电视，其实脑子已经进入他自己的思维天地，许多绝妙的创意，往往就是在这看似消受实则琢磨的悠闲中悟得。
一辈子的曲折经历使老人拥有一份睿智和大度，足以令他笑对人生的风云变幻。他常对人自嘲道：“连环画是‘小儿科’。”他称自己“充其量是个连环画家而已”。他有一幅自画像，给自己画了个很夸张的伸长着的耳朵，一对锐利、率真的眼睛，从眼镜上方审视般地注视着纷纷杂杂的人世万象，那潜台词仿佛是：“哈，什么都逃不过我的眼睛！”这位画坛老人，眼睛仍然是那么清澈、锐利、纯真！
今年的展览特别还原了许多颇具生活气息的场景，形象而立体地再现贺老的率真。有一个展区摆满了365个黄酒瓶。瓶贴全是贺友直的画，瓶盖上印的小字竟是“爸爸的生命口服液”，这是贺老的女儿写的。据了解，除了画画，贺老就剩喝酒这点爱好，尤其喜欢喝黄酒，一天一瓶，倘若不受限制，一餐一瓶都不是问题。女儿笑言，酒简直是“爸爸的生命口服液”。因为如果哪天他对酒兴致不那么高了，那就说明他的身体状况可能出了点小问题。
贺老位于上海巨鹿路上的家也被1:l地“搬”来展厅。从1956年至今，他一直住在这幢新式里弄公寓中。“大门口”挂着蓝印花布的帘子，只见“贺老”正随手掀开帘子探出头来。家中物什都是有些年岁的，老桌子、老板凳、老门、老窗、老酒、老笔墨……
连环画本就是俗到底子里的，只有渗入生活的方方面面，才更有底气。人们不难发现，老人对生活的要求真的不高，心思全花在创作上了。这一切都构成了一个活生生的他所独有的世界，真实地弥漫着贺老家的温馨，以及他那透着浓浓市井气息的画风。而今，鹤发童颜的贺老，依旧每日里一手持笔，一手端酒。人生就这样寻常地过来了，事业也就这样做出来了！
Exhibition Celebrates 91-Year-Old Picture Book Master
By Hu Shanghua
Based in Shanghai, 91-year-old He Youzhi is a legendary master of picture books in China. Both his career and achievement are unique.
First, a few words about picture book. Picture book is largely a 20th century phenomenon in China. Some historians say that the first picture book came out in 1898 in Shanghai. The gee matured and flourished from the 1950s to the 1990s. It went out of fashion toward the end of the 20th century. Picture books in the 20th-century China resemble manga books and comics of Japan and America, but there is a big difference: comic books are usually original creations in text and painting whereas picture books in China are primarily pictorial adaptations of novels, history, legends, myths, fables, folktales, films, and theater plays. Artists did not create stories. Usually an artist wrote a very brief script, one short paragraph of text for one picture. A picture book looks like a collection of a large number of illustrations. Unlike large-format picture books for children with large pictures and a few words or no words at all, the picture books are small, usually in the standard sixty-fourmo format. These picture books targeted both children and adults.
He Youzhi is an outstanding career picture book artist. Many fellow picture book masters were prominent artists. They were largely known for their fine art accomplishment. For these masters, picture book paintings were more or less like side products. Unlike most of his peers, He Youzhi started and ended his career as a picture book artist. He was the first picture-book master offered professorship at the Central Academy of Fine Arts in the 1980s when the academy set up a department for training talents for picture book and Spring Festival painting. The department was abolished when picture book as a literary phenomenon went out of fashion.
He Youzhi did not have formal art training whatsoever. He was brought up by his aunt in the rural area of Ningbo after his mother died when he was very young. The primary school where he studied was housed in a temple of Lord Guan. A theater stage inside the temple compound was decorated with illustrations of the Romance of Three Kingdoms, a classical novel created during the Ming Dynasty (1368-1644). Fascinated by these illustrations, the boy studied them and copied them repeatedly until he got all the pictures right.
The year 1937 marked a turning point in his life. That year, he graduated from primary school, the war broke out and his father became unemployed. The boy worked in a small blacksmith and then a printing house in rural Ningbo. He even worked as a teacher in a rural primary school. Disappointed in the future that the rural area could possibly offer, He Youzhi came to Shanghai. As he was able to draw, he looked for a job that had something to do with painting. After an audition, he was employed to draw trademarks. His relatives saw the young man was promising and recommended him to a few artists who did picture books for a living. He learned fast. That was how He Youzhi stepped into the field.
His first picture book was an adaptation of a short story by Zhao Shuli (1906-1970), a leading storywriter specialized in depicting rural life who launching an influential literary movement in the 20th Chinese writing. He Youzhi visualized the story in his mind and wrote his own script. Then he spent days drawing. He did more than 200 drawings for the story. A publisher printed the picture book and it sold well. It was 1949 and He Youzhi was 28 years old.
The success of his first picture book started his career as a picture book artist. Over his 50-plus year career, He Youzhi produced more than 100 picture books. His “Huge Changes in Mountainous Town” in the early 1960s is considered as a landmark success in the history of picture books of China. In 1963, it won a first prize at the 1st National Picture Book Award Conference jointly sponsored by Ministry of Culture and China Artists Associations. It was the first major career award he garnered. In the following decades, he received numerous honors for his picture books.
His representative picture books are in the collection of China Art Museum, Shanghai Art Museum and Guangzhou Art Museum. He has held solo exhibitions in France, Germany and Singapore. His artworks have been exhibited in Britain, Norway, Swiss and Korea. He is honored with Lifelong Achievement Award jointly issued by Ministry of Culture, China Federation of Literature and Art Circles and China Artists Association.
With his accomplishment in picture books, picture book is considered an honorable art gee and He Youzhi ranks side by side with artists highly accomplished in other fields, representing a short-lived art renaissance spanning the 1950s and the early 1960s.
Now 91, He Youzhi still creates paintings and teaches. In the spring of 2010, he was invited to lecture at China Academy of Art in Hangzhou. In October 2010, he set up his studio in his hometown Ningbo.
In the spring of 2012, an exhibition was held in Shanghai in honor of the 91-year-old artist. The exhibition was a little bit unusual: it did not focus upon his works. Instead, it focused on the artist himself. In one segment of the exhibition hall were 365 wine bottles on display. He still drinks, consuming a bottle of rice wine a day.