1. Could you tell us about your recent works of creation?
How's Hong Kong people's feedback to the work?
I've recently made two installations, which are a bit different with my previous pattern series. They appear not to be too decorative or even invisible at first sight but one of the main ideas is still about the way we see, look, read and what we might miss or ignore in our daily lives.
I don't know what the people in Hong Kong think about them since not many tell me what they think about it but one of my friends thought that it is a different way to deal with space and texts, and, is not the same approach with my previous works.
2. When did you start creating any artwork?
How did you start your career?
I really started to make art when I was an undergraduate student in the university. After two years of learning, I tried to make something that could reflect my thoughts and concerns about art, society or myself and after some experiments, I started to use elements like character, calligraphy, etc. in my works.
I think, at that time, many of my classmates started to make art and we also tried to find different ways to show our works, so we started to curate the show by ourselves when we were still studying. Of course, some of us didn't continue after graduation but I continued to have different exhibitions after that. So I guess my career started from that time when I was a third-year art student in the school.
3. Your works (the artwork created with many characters) seems so unique, dynamic and conceptual. How did you originally come up with the idea of the installation using letters?
I always like some traditional things likes woodblock print, stone carving and especially Chinese calligraphy and I still remember that we had to practice calligraphy and submitted our works to the teacher at least once a week when I was studying in primary school. That really gave me a chance to learn about our culture and the use of the brush, the stroke, the ink and the characters just fascinated me. So when I had chance to learn more lately in the university, I learnt all different styles of calligraphy and practiced them quite a lot.
I didn't realize my interest is that strong but when I started to make my own work, I found that these could be some good elements that I can use to express my feelings and thoughts. So I started to use the character and to tell different things or stories through the use of text and image. At that time, woodblock print, stone carving and other traditional things were some other sources that gave me inspiration. But my works were still 2 dimensional and didn't involve much with the space or environment.
Later I was attracted by the space and the relationship between a work, the space and the viewer, so I did some experiments and after studying in London, I finally found a way work with space and started to make installation works.
4. What kind of events, things or moments in your daily life turns to be the source of your inspiration? When you come up with any specific idea for the artwork, how do you develop the idea to make it into real art piece?
I think my daily life, the people I met and the things that happened on me always turn to be the source of my inspiration. This is especially obvious and important when I was studying in London in 2002-03 where I really had a bad time and full of frustrations. These kinds of experience gave me lots of feeling or you can say "inspiration", which turned out to be the content of my works. But when I am now looking back, that period of time did changed me a lot and it is also a "good" thing that pushed me to open my mind or push me to start making my installation works.
I spent about a year to realize the project, did some researches about the relationship between text and image, sex and swear words, etc. I chose a pattern by William Morris and did some experiments with the text and colour. It was also good that my tutors gave me some advice and so finally it turned out to be like wallpaper with simple colours to create a light and pleasant space with my "wallpaper" covered all the surfaces of studio for my graduation show.
5. Recently you held the exhibition in Tokyo. How did you like your 1st exhibition in Tokyo? Did you feel anything different or special in Tokyo or people's reaction in Tokyo, comparing to Hong Kong?
I think it was great. Even though it is a bit short, I really enjoyed it. The gallery owner, Mr. Kiyoyuki Sawai, is really supportive and open-minded. I also quite satisfied with the installation and seem to see some other possibilities of my work.
About the people's reaction, I think, may be, it is a bit similar that not many people like contemporary art or go to contemporary art gallery but one thing quite different is that those I met in the gallery seems to be really anticipate or look at the work, and, more appreciate art and give respect to the artists. But these are just the things that I felt during a short stay in Tokyo.
6. You also worked on the stage artwork for a musical concert in Tokyo.
What do you think of working with artists/creators in any other genres such as musicians or dancers? Are you interested in creation in any other media by yourself?
I think it was quite a new experience to me since I always work alone and never work with other artists, musicians, etc. I had to learn to work with the others and sometimes also had to adjust my ideas in order not to dominate the whole thing or due to different restrictions. It was lot of fun actually even though it was not easy.
I often like music and even wanted to make some music when I was not so busy in the past. I hope I can really make my own music in the future.
7. What would you like to share with your audience through your works?
I want to show the other sides of thing to the audience which may be missed, ignored or rejected by the society, norms, believes, etc. There are lots of thing happening around us but sometimes we just forgot or missed. And I don't think there is any absoluteness in thing, even though some people still believe or never thought about it. These are some ideas that I would like to share with the audience.
8. Could you choose one from your work especially you like or very impressive to you?
I think I would choose "Untitled - Hong Kong" because it is probably the largest scale of installation that I have made which is really impressive and powerful to me. It is also about my feelings of losing identity of being an immigrant from the Mainland China to live in Hong Kong.
9. Who is your favorite artist (in any genre)?
Kurt Cobain from Nirvana.
10. What do you think of creative scene in Hong Kong now?
How would you like to involve with it?
Personally, I think the art scene is a bit boring here in Hong Kong and is still quite similar with the past even though there are more art spaces or exhibitions than before. There are not many interesting exhibitions and I think the worst thing is that most Hong Kong people don't like or anticipate art or contemporary art which is the thing always make me feel frustrated.
I would still like to get involved if there is any interesting project holding in Hong Kong but probably I may start not to involve as much as before and would put my focus on other places if possible.
11. What kind of works do you want to create in the future?
Is there any plan for next creation?
Actually I want to try more different things in the future like music, video or may be even literature and just to see if there is any possibilities to make my works in different ways or merge them to create other kind of things. It is still difficult to say at the moment.
For my next creation, I think I would follow what I discover from the latest work done in Tokyo and try to investigate more about the nature of a space by the changes of light, colour and feeling through the passage of time, and its relationship with different contents and texts.
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| Interior |
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| ISHOPYOUSHOPHESHOPSHESHOPIT SHOPTHEYSHOPISHOPYOUSHOPHE SHOPSHESHOPITSHOPTHEYSHOP... |
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| Chinese! It's Chinese |
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Dragon/Jormungand/Serpent/
Imperiality/Devil/Chinese/
Norwegian/Satan/God/
Overmanc |
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| Untitled - Hong Kong |
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