What is your personal artistic motto or mission in a sentence or two?

Art has no language barriers and has ability to speak to all people no matter what language they talk. It is a universal language that is able to evoke emotions, ideas and thoughts. Working as an artist, I would love to show the culture in my paintings and create art pieces I hope touch people everywhere.

What are three words that describe your style?

Expressive, Loose-fitting, and Traditional

Where are you coming from and how did you start your artistic journey?

I was originally from China. When I was in elementary school, I learned from a local artist to paint Chinese traditional Watercolor painting. And continually, I was trained on sketching and painting with different medium, such as gauche and watercolor.  With the artistic training background, I studied environmental art design during the college years in Shanghai, China.  I came to the US in 2002 to pursue a Master of Landscape Architecture. After I gained my master degree I started to practice in urban design, park design, open space design and community planning in the DMV area in 2006. I have been an urban designer / landscape designer for over 10 years. During Covid period, I created Happying Art Studio to teach Chinese watercolor online within our Chinese social group. Now I am a full-time artist!

What inspires you to create? What holds you back?

Emotions, Natural Sources or other artists and their works could inspire me to create and paint more.

What holds me back is when I want to be productive but I’m not inspired so I feel like forcing it will give me a product I’m unhappy with- that snowballs into the idea that if I try I will just end up unhappy so I give up before I’ve started.

What is your favorite piece you have created or favorite art experience, and why?

For now, the watercolor painting “white camelia” is my favorite piece. First of all I love the translucent color I created, second, I didn’t overdo it and kept the colors clean and layers are clear to see.  Third, I kept the white space as much as can. The colors are similar, but the color combination created harmony.

My favorite art experience was that at my last year of graduate school, my colleague and I created the showcase about “the Oriental Garden and Chinese watercolor Painting”. During the show, almost all my Chinese watercolor paintings were sold at the showcase. I was so proud to introduce the different culture to the school and the whole community.

Tell us something positive that has happened to you in the last month?

As is always the case, a visit from family.

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