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Interview | Beijing and Shanghai-based Artist Dongbay (Yübo Xü)
Dongbay (Yübo Xü) is an artist and eco-warrior based between Beijing and Shanghai. Born in the Northeast of China and shaped by a nomadic upbringing, his practice explores humanity’s fading connection to nature amid accelerating industrial and digital transformation. Through installations, films, and writing, he combines organic materials with urban detritus, developing concepts such as primitive futurism and ritual minimalism to examine how ecological wisdom can be reimagined in the Anthropocene.
髡锁 Quene Locks, 2023, Recycled animal materials and mixed media, 250 x 200 x100 cm Can you tell us about your background and how you started your artistic journey?
I was born in an industrial town in Northeast China, a place where wetlands, oil rigs, and machinery existed in the same breath. My family moved frequently, shaping my relationship with land as something fluid rather than fixed. This nomadic rhythm became the foundation of my artistic practice.
My path into art did not begin with theory; it began with daily life. I grew up observing the streets, the people, and the shifting landscapes around me, and I started creating simply out of an instinct to respond to what I saw. Graffiti, drawing, and small interventions in public space were my earliest forms of expression, long before I had the language to describe why I was making them.
Over time, these intuitive practices became a doorway into deeper questions. The environments I moved through, industrial relics, expanding cities, and later, remote regions during fieldwork, made me aware of how quickly our connection to land and non-human life was disappearing. What began as a personal habit of looking gradually evolved into a more serious inquiry into ecology, belief, and the emotional cost of modernization.
Today, my installations, films, and field-based projects continue to grow out of this mixture of lived experience, street-level observation, and long-term research into how humans navigate the Anthropocene.
髡锁 Quene Locks, 2023, Recycled animal materials and mixed media, 250 x 200 x100 cm What are the main themes or concepts you explore in your work?
My work revolves around two guiding concepts: primitive futurism and ritual minimalism.
Primitive futurism imagines a world where ancient intuition and modern systems coexist, where mythology and technology are not opposites but parallel forms of ecological memory. Ritual minimalism strips away excess narrative to restore a sense of spiritual density in contemporary art.
More broadly, I examine themes of ecological rupture, industrial debris, spiritual displacement, material reincarnation, and the fading ability of humans to perceive the non-human world. My installations become a space where the synthetic and the organic collide, forcing us to rethink coexistence in an era of crisis.
Synth Totem, 2024, Recycled animal materials and mixed media, 280 x 250 x 80 cm How do your personal experiences and identity influence your art?
My identity is shaped by migration, industrial landscapes, and long-term fieldwork in different ecological communities. Growing up in rapidly changing oil towns taught me that land is alive, which is volatile, resilient, and wounded.
This background makes me sensitive to environments where the connection between land and life is disappearing. I spend extended periods living in remote or peripheral regions, learning from people whose ecological wisdom still survives modernization. These lived experiences, not documentation, become the emotional and structural logic of my work.
Rather than positioning myself above the material, I approach creation as a collaboration with land, memory, and the overlooked. The “eco-warrior” aspect of my identity is not a statement but a responsibility I carry into the work.
Synth Totem, 2024, Recycled skateboard trucks and mixed media, 280 x 120 x 6 cm Are there any specific materials you prefer working with in your installation work? Why?
I often work with recycled industrial waste, like steel cables, electrical wires, skateboard trucks, and recycled organic remnants such as animal hides, bones, and human hair.
These materials are embedded with stories of exploitation, abandonment, and resilience. Industrial debris carries the imprint of overproduction; animal hides salvaged from poaching reflect ecological violence; human hair connects the work back to the body.
By weaving these fragments together, I create hybrid structures, part creature, part relic, that embody both decay and rebirth. Using what has been discarded allows the work to become a form of alchemy, transforming residues of destruction into carriers of new meaning.
Goddess Who Sells Time, 2025, Recycled animal skins and mixed media, 350 x 200 x 180 cm Can you describe a recent project or artwork that you are particularly proud of?
A recent project I am developing is Goddess Who Sells Time, an installation shaped by my field research in India, especially in environments where caste, labor, and belief intersect. The work draws from the symbolism of Chhinnamasta, reinterpreting her cycle of creation, preservation, and destruction as a contemporary logic of self-exposure and resistance.
The installation uses local bamboo scaffolding, recycled animal hides, industrial debris, and regional calendar pages, materials deeply tied to everyday survival in lower-caste communities. The Trinity Puzzle section incorporates blue Dalit-associated text fragments arranged in scrambled sequences, requiring viewers to “spend time” reconstructing meaning. This reading process becomes a quiet act of confronting the social cycles that structure caste hierarchies.
Rather than representing a single encounter, the work reflects the broader political and spiritual tensions I observed on-site. It is both a ritual structure and a social commentary, exploring how marginalized groups sustain belief, dignity, and resistance within systems that attempt to contain them.
Goddess Who Sells Time, 2025, Recycled animal skins and mixed media, 350 x 200 x 180 cm What do you hope people take away from your art when they experience it?
I hope my work slows people down, just enough for them to sense the nearly imperceptible rhythms that still exist beneath the noise of modern life.
I am not offering solutions or nostalgia. Instead, I create openings where viewers can feel the tension between decay and vitality, between the synthetic and the natural, between technology and myth.
If people walk away with a renewed awareness, an understanding that coexistence requires reciprocity rather than control, then the work has done its job. Ultimately, I want my works to reactivate a form of ecological perception that our era is rapidly losing.
Text & photo courtesy of Dongbay (Yübo Xü)
Website: https://totemdongbay.com/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/totemdongbay/
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Interview | Shanghai-Based Artist Annan Shao
Annan Shao (b.1998) is a new media artist based in Shanghai. Her works explore the evolution of individual motivation by combining the mediums of new media animation and mixed media installations. Through the creation of virtual ecology and mixed media field narratives, she maps reality with allegorical hypothetical spatial and temporal events.
She graduated from the China Academy of Art with a Bachelor’s degree in visual communication and a Master’s degree in fine art from Chelsea College of Art and Design, University of the Arts London.Her works have been exhibited at Shangh Art Gallery, Tank Shanghai, Guangdong Contemporary Art Centre, Gravity Art Museum (Beijing), Zabludowicz Collection (London), etc.
In 2025, her work Reptile Cafe is selected in Athens Digital Art Festival under the animation category “Eden’s Fringe”. In 2024, Reptile Cafe won the Nescience or the State of not Knowing international digital art call curated by MMMAD Art Festival. In 2023, her work Customised New Routine won the From Micro To Macro and Back digital art call by SMTH Art in Spain, and her work Highway Sushi won the NAFI Future prize from Nanjing Art Fair International. She is currently active as an artist and designer on international platforms.
Highway Sushi, 2022, 3D animation, 1920 x 1080p Can you tell us about your background and how you started your artistic journey?
I was born in 1998 in Nanjing, Jiangsu Province. I received my BA in Visual Communication from the China Academy of Art and my MA in Fine Art from Chelsea College of Arts, University of the Arts London.
My artistic journey began quite early. I’ve always loved drawing and crafting — I decided I wanted to be a painter when I was six (before I didn’t know how broad “art” could be; now I would describe myself as a new media artist).
I was unexpectedly admitted to a design department for my undergraduate studies. At first, I felt a bit lost and resistant, because I was more skilled with hands-on crafts than with digital tools. But later I realized that Visual Communication is actually a broad field — not just traditional graphic design. What I gained most from my time at the China Academy of Art was the ability to translate ideas and concepts into visual narratives, and to become proficient with digital media.
Eventually, I felt drawn back to contemporary art, so I pursued MA Fine Art at UAL. When I arrived in London in 2020, the whole city was under lockdown. With nothing much to do, I started watching online 3D tutorials. I found that I had a natural sensitivity for spatial imagination — after a week of learning, I made my first animation work Artificial Horizon. The positive feedback I received from my early new media works gave me confidence to continue down this creative path.
Customised New Routine, 2023, 3D animation, 4k video What are the main themes or concepts you explore in your new media art? Are there any particular media you prefer working with? Why?
My practice explores how social motives evolve, often through the creation of virtual ecologies and mixed-media field narratives. In recent years, my works have developed from personal experiences and daily sensations, expanding private imagery into reflections on broader social conditions.
Each year, I create an annual project centered on new media — mainly 3D animation — combined with installation and interactive or physical extensions. For me, moving image and installation always mirror each other: the narratives in my videos often expand into physical space, while the spatial structures of my installations feed back into the image.
Creating larger-scale environments and more complex site-specific settings feels like a crucial step forward, as it links virtual storytelling with real, sensory experiences — building an immersive and coherent language that connects imagination with lived reality.
Reptile Cafe, 2024, 3D animation, 4k video Can you describe a recent project or artwork that you are particularly proud of?
My recent project Reptile Café is one that I’m proud of.
Reptile Café uses reptilian behavioral symbols and virtual beverage brands to discuss the post-human instinct under the soothing influence of contemporary beverage culture. In the animation, viewers experience the café’s service process from a first-person perspective — exploring their desires and hallucinations through visualized flavors, mapping behavioral patterns governed by the “reptilian brain.”
The hope is that, after immersion, the caffeine-washed reptilian brain might still allow us to contemplate the possibility of observing this system from outside.
I’m satisfied with this project because everything I envisioned in the early concept phase was realized: the large-screen video exhibition (won the digital art open call Nescience or the State of Not Knowing, touring eight city complexes in Spain including Madrid and Barcelona), the online interactive show (presented with the new media art platform Slime Engine), the physical installation exhibition (in Trapping Fever at ShanghART Gallery), a food-themed workshop and window project(at Gravity Art Museum, Beijing), and even an art café presentation (at Tank Shanghai).
Reptile Cafe at Slime Engine, Courtesy of the artist and Slime Engine How do you get inspiration for creating futuristic scenes in your 3D animation work?
I don’t deliberately pursue a futuristic aesthetic — the scenes are always built in service of the story. What matters most to me is world-building: I want everything that appears in the animation — from the environment to the characters — to be designed by me, not taken from real life. Only then does it belong to my world. Perhaps that’s where the sense of “alienation” or “futurism” comes from.
The design of each scene develops from the project’s central concept. For instance, Highway Sushi has an urban and restrained visual tone because it tells a story about informational closed loops through food. Customised New Routine features bluish-purple, unfamiliar natural environments, reflecting the theme of self-creation and individual interpretation of the world. Meanwhile, Reptile Café uses warm, organic, and slightly creepy tones — it looks delicious but unsettling — echoing its focus on instinctual control through dessert and beverage metaphors.
Map, 2024, Mixed materials, 520 x 693 x 130 mm As a digital artist, how do you approach exhibiting your work? What are your goals when showing your art in digital and physical spaces?
I wouldn’t define myself as a purely digital artist — rather, a cross-media artist. Besides 3D animation, I also work with installation, and recently I’ve explored interactive and edible art. In the future, I’d like to experiment with games and performance as well. Each annual project begins with a moving image as the core, then expands into more tangible and participatory media.
Online, my collaboration with Slime Engine is a good example. Instead of simply screening the animation on a webpage, we created interactive experiences: visitors could “order” a drink, be flushed into the café’s hall through a stream of liquid, watch their chosen beverage being made, explore the back kitchen, be “fed” by the gecko maid, experience sensory hallucinations — and finally receive a virtual flash card of their customized drink. I hope online exhibitions can fully leverage the advantages of digital media: to be engaging, playful, and participatory.
Offline, my moving images have been shown in various contexts — from city façades (large outdoor screens) to gallery and museum projections. When exhibiting in art spaces, I pay close attention to the relationship between video and installation, aiming to build site narratives that link the two.
Gelato Clock, 2025, Mixed materials, 251 x 530 x 48.6 mm What projects are you currently working on, and what can we expect from you in the future?
I’m currently working on my 2025 annual project, Hamster Run. It revolves around self-confrontation and temporal dissonance, combining animation (or game) with installation. Using rodent behavioral symbols and nonlinear virtual storytelling, it depicts how humans wrestle with their own instincts and darker impulses, and the anxiety of being out of sync with time.
Last year, I adopted a golden hamster — a nocturnal animal. Many nights, while I was facing my screen, I heard her running frantically on her wheel, and felt my restless thoughts tied to her small, trembling body. Caring for her felt less like keeping a pet and more like comforting a version of myself unburdened by social responsibility, concerned only with instinctual needs. Yet when she acted stubborn or clumsy, I saw in her my own irrational nighttime self.
This projection led me to doubt the continuity of the self across time. We often cannot bear our past selves — even the person we were a moment ago. As external conditions shift, we chase a vaguely “better” state, yet dissatisfaction follows us everywhere.
A hamster runs desperately when anxious, as if it could escape its cage — but when it stops, disoriented, it finds itself still in the same place.
Rodents’ nocturnal habits mirror human cycles of insomnia, bingeing, anxiety, and self-judgment. This project builds a symbolic space to explore one’s relationship with different temporal selves — especially the parts we refuse to forgive or face.
Looking ahead, I want to create site-specific exhibitions structured like narratives. By combining installation, 3D animation, and performative elements, I imagine building environments that can be worn, consumed, or self-sustaining — almost like habitats where audiences are guided into sensory systems governed by soft discipline. Within such spaces, I test how instinct and attention are shaped by technology, consumption, and design.
Text & photo courtesy of Annan Shao
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/shaoannan/
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Interview | Shanghai-based Artists Ji Wenyu and Zhu Weibing
Climbing Up the Mountain, 2009, Thread, cloth, wood, metal hoop, wadding, 1813 x 94 x 20 cm x 2 puppet Can you tell us about your background and how you started your artistic journey?
Ji Wenyu: Before 2004, I primarily worked in easel painting, while my wife Zhu Weibing was in clothing design. I was quite lost in my painting practice at that time, the biggest issue was that there were no more issues. Whatever I wanted to do, the result was predictable. There was no novelty, no anticipation, and no new possibilities. It was a big crisis for me. One day, I was talking to Zhu Weibing about art. She told me she also felt lost in clothing design and wanted to transition into contemporary art, though she still kept a strong passion for fabric. We both felt that fabric might be an excellent starting point for our future creations, even though we both had a great different opinions about it. Fabric to me is stubborn. It doesn’t obey me, it’s contrary, it has its own material qualities. But that’s exactly what opened up new possibilities for me. From then on, we became a duo, and we’ve continued ever since.
Zhu Weibing: I studied clothing design, but I’ve always dreamed of making art. Back in 2003, during a conversation with Ji Wenyu, we instantly hit it off. We decided to use the fabric as a material we familiar with to experiment with it and making art.
People Holding Flowers, 2007, Velour, steel wire, dacron, lodestone, cotton, synthetic polymer paint on resin, 17 x 11 x 102 x 400 cm How do you stay inspired and motivated to create new work?
Ji Wenyu: Over the past thirty years, China has underthrough tremendous changes. We’ve constantly been learning from the outside world, while also continuously drawing inspiration from our own culture. We’ve witnessed transformations in our society, lifestyle and people’s mindsets. Every one of these changes compels us to feel, to experience, and to reflect. Our artistic practice is simply an attempt to express those sensations as accurately as possible.
Zhu Weibing: I believe that creativity stems from the subtle perceptions of everyday life, and from the urge to express and connect. I often feel a strange sense of doubt or illusion about my current life circumstances. Maybe it’s that restless mindset that pushes me to explore the unknown. And art happens to be a form of expression that I’m both good at and genuinely enjoy!
Compromise failed, 2018, Artificial whool, cloth, wadding, 227 x 108 x 84 cm How did you both start working together as a team?
Ji Wenyu: We discuss everything together, and sometimes we argue with each other. When we really can’t reach an agreement, we just set it aside for a while and revisit it later. Once we come to a shared understanding, we think about how to turn it into a piece of work. During the process, disagreements still pop up, so we keep adjusting. That’s how we’ve continued working together until now. Sometimes we even interpret the same work differently, but we’re still able to complete it together as a unified piece.
Zhu Weibing: As a married couple, we share many perspectives, but we also have many different opinions. There’s a saying in Chinese: “seeking common ground while reserving differences.” I think the friction and mutual adjustments we go through are actually a process of growing together.
Rebuild the wall by using the cotton rope, 2018, Cotton rope, 1840 x 450 cm Is there a particular piece of work that feels especially meaningful to you? Why?
Ji Wenyu: Every work for us carries its own significance, it’s hard to rank them. But there’s one project I’d like to talk about. In 2018, under the national push to preserve tulou (earthen architecture) and promote the “New Countryside” initiative, we were invited to Nanping, Fujian, to create a site-specific piece. With the acceleration of urbanization, many rural residents had left for the cities to work, and some had permanently relocated. What remained was a landscape of rural desolation. I stood in front of a crumbing earthen house, its roof and interior wooden structures had completely disappeared. Nearly half the walls had collapsed, and the wild grass had grown waist-high. In the glow of the setting sun, the scene felt like the end of a ruined world.
The proposal was as follows:
The collapsed sections of the walls would be “restored” imaginatively using white cotton ropes (1 cm in diameter). Within these rope-based reconstructions, we would maintain doorways and windows scaled to the human body. At first glance, it would appear to be a restoration. One half of the structure would remain as the original, solid earthen wall; the other half, a ghostly reconstruction made of lightweight rope. The contrast between the heavy structure and the fabricated rope both highlight the act of rebuilding and subtly reveal the site’s abandonment.
The work aimed to explore the tension and interplay between natural decay and human intervention. In doing so, we hoped to prompt reflection: What does it mean when a ruin stands? And what does it mean when we attempt to “restore” it? It was also meant to imply the importance of preservation.
In the end, the rope walls only lasted two weeks. The government stepped in and funded to reconstruct the site, and brought the former relocated villagers back to rebuild the house. In a way, we felt a sense of pride as the projec revealed the essense of the place.
Zhu Weibing: Most of our works are not created for specific projects, they usually arise from a spontaneous emotional impulse. So many of our pieces are expressions of how we felt at a certain moment in a specific context. Take our 2013 piece “Climb, Upward” as an example. At the time, the broader social atmosphere was energetic, ambitious that everyone seemed to be striving upward. We were also at a stage in life when we were full of energy. But then one day, we suddenly realized that we had been taught to be successful and wealthy was the definition of a positive life. Everyone was climbing upwards, but what is the next step when you climed to the top? Thats when things started to feel confusing and disorienting. This work came directly from the specific emotional state, and i do not think this confusion was just personal. Its probably a question relate to the entire generation that we have not really figured out.
Climb, Going Upward, 2013, Cloth, foam, wire, 330×40×45cm What challenges have you faced as an artist, and how have you overcome them?
Ji Wenyu: As I mentioned earlier, before 2004 I was focused solely on easel painting. My work was quite popular at the time, but I began to experience a personal crisis. I felt like I was producing art for clients every day, and there was no longer any sense of creative excitement. If I continued down that path, I feared both my spirit and my artistic language would wither. Most importantly, I felt I had lost the sense of new possibility.
Then one day, I had a conversation about art with my wife. We started talking about fabric, and gradually I became excited by the material. Fabric is soft, resistant to shaping, and even when you manage to shape it, it’s hard to reproduce the same form again. For someone trained as a painter, this presented an obvious challenge. Its unpredictability defies control, yet that unpredictability can bring unexpected surprises. It demands the artist’s sensitivity to fully grasp its potential. Its flaws, in fact, are what make its character stand out. In some ways, it’s anti-sculptural. You can fill it with cotton and make it a solid three-dimensional form, or you can remove the stuffing, or only partially fill it, so it slumps and softens. You can drape it over a chair, a table, or any object, and it will conform to the object’s form while still asserting its own presence. It can completely envelop another shape and draw attention not just to what it covers, but to the beauty of the fabric itself. You can also hang it, and under the influence of wind or other forces, it floats, curls, sways. It’s casual, adaptable, warm, but not easy to manipulate. It has its own temperament, its own personality. It blends all of these traits together and emits endless possibilities. That was when I felt my crisis relieved. It was also the beginning of my collaboration with my wife, Zhu Weibing.
Zhu weibing: In the beginning, the biggest challenge for me in our artistic practice was how difficult it was to control the material. Even though I came from a background in clothing design, art-making is a completely different process. I had to find new ways of working that aligned with our conceptual approach. Some of the techniques I knew from clothing and toy-making gave me initial inspiration, but they weren’t enough for what we wanted to express. I didn’t want to be confined by those conventions. So early on, we made a rule for ourselves: the work must not look like a toy, must not look like a craft object, and must not look like folk art.
Another challenge was the fact that, as a female artist, I was often overwhelmed by daily responsibilities. I had to learn to cut out the unnecessary demands of everyday life whenever possible, and to regularly reflect inward and adjust my mindset. I believe this kind of inner work has been deeply helpful to my artistic process.
Enough food for these fish, 2018, Cloth, gauze, wadding, foam, wire, thread, wooden frame, 146 x 114 x 86 cm What advice would you give to emerging artists trying to establish themselves?
Ji Wenyu: Consistently produce strong works that resonate with the times, continually communicate their artistic vision and ideas to their audience, and keep holding exhibitions so that audiences and collectors can better understand the work, and allowing more people to appreciate both the artists and their art.
Zhu Weibing: Genuinely love creating art. Make what you love, make what others might love, and share just enough of yourself to let people in.
Text & photo courtesy of Ji Wenyu and Zhu Weibing
Website: www.jizhu99.com
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/jiwenyu_zhuweibing/
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Interview | Shanghai-based Artist Fanglu Lin
Fanglu Lin is a Chinese artist working with fiber and textile-based sculpture. She holds both a BA and MFA from the Central Academy of Fine Arts in Beijing, and has studied at the Karlsruhe University of Arts and Design and Tokyo University of the Arts.
Her practice draws from the material traditions of ethnic minorities in China, particularly the Bai and Dong communities. Through extensive field research and hands-on learning, she reinterprets endangered techniques such as Bai tie-dye and Dong “liangbu” cloth into contemporary artworks that explore memory, identity, and resilience.
Lin has exhibited at major exhibitions and institutions including the Venice Homo Faber (2024), LOEWE: Crafted World, NGV Triennial, Musée des Arts Décoratifs in Paris, and the Power Station of Art in Shanghai. Solo exhibitions include It’s All About Her(2025) and She’s Body (2023). In 2021, she received the LOEWE Foundation Craft Prize. Her work is held in collections such as the Victoria and Albert Museum, Musée des Arts Décoratifs, and the National Gallery of Victoria.
She’s Fiery Love No.1, 2023 Can you tell us about your background and how you started your artistic journey?
I was born in China and received both my BA and MFA in Artistic Design from the Central Academy of Fine Arts in Beijing. During my studies, I also had the opportunity to participate in exchange programs at the Karlsruhe University of Arts and Design in Germany and the Tokyo University of the Arts in Japan. These experiences broadened my view of material practices across cultures and shaped my understanding of textile as a form of visual and conceptual expression.
My artistic journey truly began when I started traveling to rural regions in China, particularly in Yunnan and Guizhou, to learn traditional textile techniques practiced by ethnic minority communities. I spent extended periods studying these endangered crafts—such as the Bai women’s tie-dye and the Dong people’s liangbu fabric production—through direct observation, hands-on practice, and immersion in the local environments. These experiences became the foundation of my current practice, in which I independently create fiber-based artworks that reinterpret these ancient techniques in a contemporary artistic language.
She’s Earth, 2024, Commissioned by Loewe Foundation, Exhibited at Crafted World How do you select and prepare your materials, particularly natural fibers and dyes, to achieve the desired textures and forms in your pieces?
I often work with natural fibers such as handwoven cotton or linen, which I source carefully to align with the traditional materials I encountered during my research. I also use natural dyes—indigo in particular—not only for their visual qualities but for their historical and cultural significance.
The preparation of these materials is a meditative and labor-intensive process. I bind, twist, wrap, and layer fabrics repeatedly, creating densely textured surfaces that embody both fragility and strength. While the techniques I use are rooted in tradition, I approach them through a contemporary sculptural sensibility, often pushing their physical limits to explore volume, pressure, and form.
How has your artistic style evolved over time?
My style has gradually shifted from two-dimensional explorations to large-scale sculptural installations. In earlier years, I was more focused on patterns and surface manipulation. Over time, however, my practice became more spatial and physical—I began to think of fabric not only as something to look at, but as something that can hold space and weight, and interact with the body and architecture.
This evolution also reflects my deeper engagement with slowness, repetition, and manual labor as conceptual frameworks. My current works often embody long durations of solitary making, where each stitch, knot, or fold becomes a record of time and intention.
She’s Bestowed Love, 2025, Commissioned work by the Penninsula Hotels, Collected by the Victoria and Albert Museum, Photo credit to the Peninsula HotelsHotels What are some of the key themes or emotions you try to express through your art?
Resilience, silence, and the layered presence of history are recurring themes in my work. I am especially interested in how materials carry cultural memory—how the way we dye, bind, or fold a piece of cloth can become a form of storytelling.
There is often a tension between softness and strength in my work. Many pieces may appear delicate, but they are the result of physically demanding and repetitive labor. This paradox reflects my exploration of identity, femininity, and the embodied experience of making.
What challenges have you faced as an artist, and how have you overcome them?
One of the biggest challenges is working with slow, handmade processes in a fast-paced, productivity-driven art world. Much of what I do takes weeks or months to complete, often in solitude. It requires mental and physical endurance, and sometimes the patience to let a work unfold organically.
Another challenge is the misunderstanding that traditional techniques belong only to the past. I’ve had to assert that these methods are not static—they can evolve, transform, and speak powerfully to contemporary concerns. Through my work, I hope to challenge the divide between craft and art, and to show how the act of making can be both personal and political.
She’s Four Seasons, 2023, Commissioned and Collected by the National Gallery of Victoria What advice would you give to emerging artists trying to establish themselves?
Trust your instincts and your pace. It’s easy to feel pressure to fit into certain trends or markets, but real growth comes from listening to what moves you and staying committed to it.
Also, don’t be afraid to go deep into something specific. Research, travel, practice—whatever it takes to build your own vocabulary. For me, going to remote villages to learn textile techniques wasn’t part of a plan—it was just something I felt drawn to. That path ended up becoming my language.
Text & photo courtesy of Fanglu Lin
Website: https://www.linfanglu.com
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/linfanglu_lulu/
