Interview: Xu Hui
Luca Curci talks with Xu Hui during THE BODY LANGUAGE 2020 at Palazzo Ca’ Zanardi.

Xu Hui is mainly engaged in drawing the original hand painting silk artwork and is fond of painting contemporary art and making design. She is appointed as a researcher of Chinese National Academy of Arts, a member of Shanghai Artists Association. Her art info has been issued on the website of the Shanghai Federation of literary, listed in the Talent Pool of China Academy of Art Culture, her Artworks has been published in the Collected Book of the Suzhou Private Art Bank in the China Construction Bank, promulgated on the website of Yachang Auction in China, and her some artworks’ copyrights has been successfully authorized in a non-exclusive manner. Xu Hui has devoted herself to art creation for many years and participated in numerous art expo in China, USA, Italy, Belgium and Japan etc. Her artworks has been obtained Golden, Silver, Bronze Awards and other art prizes in different high level art exhibitions and displayed at the National Art Museum of China, Chinese History Museum, China People’s Revolutionary Military Museum, Beijing National Culture Palace, Beijing Contemporary Art Museum, Shanghai Museum, Hainan Province Museum, China, Tokyo Museum, Japan, Pier94 (the New York International Art Expo, USA), the Room Contemporary Art Space in Venice, Italy, in Brussels, Belgium, in the Yuyan Treasure House, Shanghai and so on. Moreover, Xuhui was encouraged by the Cultural Counselor of the Chinese Consulate General in New York. Her art info and artworks have been separately reported by Italy media, CCTV, Calligraphy and Painting Channel, Yachang Auction Web, Contemporary Art Web, Tianjin Arts Web, NetEase, Youku, Sohu, etc. The Silk work is one of Chinese culture and arts treasures. It is hand painting on silk material with Chinese pigment and brush. With the silk owing to its Chinese characteristics opening the road had been formed in ancient times and famous around the world through the exchange of China-West trade. Just because of this, painting on the silk has been considered a kind of high-end level art collection up to now. Due to the hand painting silk work is a hard work, which needs high level and strong patience, needs to spend long time to draw, and it is unable to modified and the scarcity of fine works has always been regarded as a collection of value appreciation. Moreover, Xu Hui designs her own LOGO and sets up personal art web by herself, making conceptual design of artistic derivative based on her own works and for her own home to do soft-matching design. She had been a garment fabric designer and advertising designs for a large foreign trade company. Therefore, her artistic experiences are capable of combining art with multi-industry reaching to be cross-border integration.

Luca Curci – What’s your background?
Xu Hui – I am a Chinese artist who is engaged in the art of original hand-painting silk painting and I come from Shanghai, my hometown. As a child, I loved art and my father was the teacher of enlightenment. After self-study, research, practice and innovation, I use my own language, understanding and perception to create art. I don’t blindly follow a certain faction, and try to find a new way, striving to walk out of the art road of my own unique style. In fact, engaging in art work is not an independent unit, but closely related to other industries. In addition to always insisting on painting and creation, I have been engaged in different jobs in different industries, initially engaged in data programming, which gave me careful thinking in art; then engaged in clothing fabric pattern design and corporate image design, which opened up a variety of artistic forms; later engaged in studying abroad and investment immigration work, which established a bridge to acknowledge the world and communicate externally to art. All these experiences enable me to think about art in a cross-border and cross-dimensional way, and in Shanghai where the comfortable and elegant lives, I can create diversified more freely, more open and more compatible artworks.

LC – What is the experience that has influenced your work the most?
XH – Life emotion, passion, perception and sensibility are the burning points of art creation. Whenever I am touched by something, someone, place or emotion, I will be inspired. Every time I finish an artwork with passion, there will be countless wonderful torrents, which will promote my meditation on the next work. Every time I communicate with various visitors who come to the exhibition, I will create new ideas to add my new understanding of art.

LC – What is art for you?
XH – For me, art is free and should not be kidnapped by politics, controlled by religion, captured by money or restricted by factions. It is to release the shackles of thought and mind. Art is inclusive, should not have oppositions, collisions, but integration. There are Chinese painting rhyme and Western painting style, the coexistence of ethnic characteristics and exotic feelings, the symbiosis of traditional culture and modern ideological trend, and the common use of multiple arts and intelligent technology and more. Art is beautiful, every inch of which shows the beauty of nature, culture, thought, friendship and difference. From small to great, from individual to group, from one country to the world, it is not superficial beauty, but the beauty that makes people think deeply and resonate. Art is joyful, and we should be happy to live in the present, run to the sunshine future. To pursue the infinite art with limited life is the joy by the way of exploring, challenging and embodying the value of life. Art makes me happy, and also brings more people happier, so that people’s life become more positive and optimistic.

LC – Are your artworks focused on a specific theme?
XH – There are different themes in different stages, and different themes will produce different styles. Different themes depend on different stages of thoughts and emotions, and different styles come from their changes. The theme should be embodied by the rich connotation of expression. Only such artworks have more artistic and collection value, rather than simply using large-scale artworks to win the attention of the audience, and the artworks, with “see a world in a grain of sand”, are better. For example, in my artwork “The Colorful Foot”, I abandon the use of the whole human body, but only use the foot as a part of the body to reflect. Although the foot is small, but it is also large, for more paths and a wider range. It walks in the world with people’s consciousness, feeling the smooth, muddy, tortuous and bumpy conditions of the road, feeling the cool and warm, happiness and pain of life, mapping different experiences and feelings of life with different colors, measuring time and space, and reflecting on itself. It is the experience art and practical art in the road of life. Moreover, It will see the different effect on the other side.

LC – What is your creative process like?
XH – I study, research, practice, experience, think, feel, trigger inspiration, create, modify and change until it is perfect for the time being. It has no real end, only to move forward. The following basic points should be paid attention to in creation: 1. Composition: clear intention, reasonable spatial layout, both virtual and real, sometimes can break the situation. 2. Material selection: novelty, reasonable collocation, primary and secondary distinct. 3. Color: suitable for use, not dazzling and appealing to vulgar taste. 4. Technique: contrast and balance, static and dynamic, so that the combination of two-dimensional and three-dimensional degree, to reflect the effects of stereoscopic vision. Such the artwork “Butterfly loving flower” can be viewed from different angles, butterflies are flying into the painting. 5. Vision: Although realistic, it does not mean rigid. It should optimize the realistic content and drawing the different felling from the realistic things with my own method. 6: Artistic conception: painting the nature, the vitality, the voice of the soul, the emotion, the artistic conception, and interact frequently from vision, hearing, taste and emotion.

LC – Did your style change over the years? In which way?
XH – Unlike before, my style becomes more free and open, elegant, rich in unique personality. It has abandoned the old, absorbed the essence, expressed self-thinking and not to follow a stereotype routine, and changed the creative innovation in the invisible way. My artworks have both Chinese characteristics and contemporary innovation, full of personality and eternal artistic beauty.

LC – What do you think about the concept of this festival? In which way did it inspire you? How is it connected to the theme of the entire festival?
XH – The Body Language exhibition and Carnival fit very well. Carnival is a festival that people put on masks and different clothes to reflect real themselves from one side. The body language uses art to show false in a real way, or reveal a more real side. The inspiration of my works in this exhibition comes from the passion of carnival, the differences of foreign cultures, the experience of art life, the dialogue of my body, the circumstances of all kinds of surroundings, various emotions and so on. In addition to the carnival, the artwork lets the audience watch in silence, with visual sense, silent dialogue, ideological exploration, so that they can feel the artistic rhythm moving in the stillness, and listen to the voice outside the picture.

LC – What is the message linked to the artwork you have shown in this exhibition?
XH – In such an artwork “The peaceful and elegant Land of Peach Blossoms”, red Crowned Crane is regarded as a long-lived bird. It is often painted together with cypress and pine tree, implying happiness, auspiciousness and longevity. There are pairs of cranes are leisurely standing at the edge of the stream. The nearby place is full with fragrance and the flowing stream and the dense cypress is in the distance. With the mountain scenery indistinct, it seems that there is a mountain outside the mountain and a building outside the building, virtual and real, unconsciously into the paradise of the world. But the petals floating in the water without knowing the source don’t know where they are flowing, leaving a few mysterious feelings. The painting implies comfortable and leisurely and peaceful attitude towards life and the desire for a better life and permanent love.

LC – What do you think about ITSLIQUID Platform?
XH – In the field of art exchange and propagation, ITSLIQUID Platform has many years of experience and industry influences, has fixed show spaces, has prefect network platforms, has wide range of medias, has reliable cooperative partners and has capable service group.

LC – What do you think about the organization of our event?
XH – Artist trust them due to their profession and patient and hope to see the paper brochure and e-brochure refer to the Venice International Art Fair. Meanwhile, we expect them to lead us to participate in other famous large-scale exhibitions or through cooperate with other countries organizations.

LC – Do you think ITSLIQUID GROUP can represent an opportunity for artists?
XH – ITSLIQUID GROUP can well represent for artists and help them to develop the international market and make it easier for artists.