PTDW Grad Noontime Lecture Series
Meditation Lake, 60” x 72”, Oil on Canvas, 2019
Bio:
I grew up in Beijing being influenced equally by Eastern culture and Western culture. The ethereal utopia described by the Chinese poem The Peach Blossom Spring, the Buddhist Paradise of the West, and the Biblical Garden of Eden had inspired my landscapes and their narrative connotations. Exploring a harmonious blend of the real world and the ideal world —as embodied in both Eastern and Western culture— through my painting and drawing is at the core of my creative practice.
In my work I explore the potential of space and texture, light and color, to compose both observational landscapes and fantastical environments. I deploy a wide vocabulary of familiar and natural elements such as trees, mountains, and water as subjects in both my observational compositions and imaginary spaces. I practice plein air painting to record the landscape around me, and I work from the perceptual imagery that emerges when I am reading literature. Painting can be both a meditational and ethical practice for me. To observe, to invent, and to record transcends the limits of the individual ego and speak to the potential of the human imagination.
