interview: pingszoo

I've recently had the great pleasure to chat with a very talented L.A.-based illustrator and she agreed to answer a few questions for a short interview on Jellyfish Tales. She has started Pingszoo in 2009 as an online portfolio and, more recently, Pingshop, where one can not only view but also buy her prints. The name Pingszoo comes from her own name, Ping Zhu: "It's a fun way to give my illustrations a place to live, very similar to a zoo environment, some sort of plethora of different types of animals."

Ping likes to paint in gouache on BFK Rives print paper and she does it beautifully and with a great sense of humour. One of her major sources of inspiration is Charly Harper's work. Other things Ping loves are the animal kingdom, food, enthusiastic people, Katamari Damacy and Futura. See below for a short interview with Ping and some choice pieces:

Please tell us something about yourself and your background!

I am based in L.A., and my parents came here from China in the 80s to go to school in America. I grew up with mostly Chinese traditions, but had to learn about cultural differences just by living and interacting in America, where I was born. It was strange as a kid to straddle two different cultures, but I think it has helped in being more open in terms of perspective.

Do you have any formal art training? Where did you go to school?

I took art classes when I was in high school, and also the Saturday High classes from Art Center College of Design. After graduating from high school I came to Art Center for my Bachelor's degree in Illustration, and I'm graduating in a month!

When and how did you start illustrating/painting? What attracted you to this medium?

Trying not to sound like every person on earth...but I've drawn since I was young, and my motivation back then was just trying to be able to draw better than other kids. Eventually, in my Junior year in high school I seriously started considering pursuing art or design as a career, and I was introduced to the possibilities of what that job market could do. Plus I was terrible in all the academic subjects in school, so I was pushing to almost prove to those professions that art and design is just as important as being a lawyer or doctor. I am really attracted to inventions, whether they're physical or visual. Being about to tell a story or draw something silly, the freedom in being about to create something new is extremely attractive to me.

You mainly paint in guache. Do you also work in other mediums?

I've been working with sculpture recently, but the forms are still decorated with paper painted with gouache. There is something really appealing about gouache because it retains really vibrant pigments, but dries flat enough to look almost like a silkscreen. I really love painted textures such as dry brushing, which shows great gestures on a flat graphic surface. I painted with brush pens which look very graphic novel-y because it's just in black on white paper. For now gouache seems to be floating my boat really well, so if I do ever mosey away from it, I'm sure it will still be related to painting....but for now that doesn't seem likely!

jwt shanghai & hailong li: shan shui animation

This post has been originally posted on Neocha EDGE.

The China Environment Protection Foundation(CEPF) recently commissioned JWT Shanghai to develop three print advertisements using shan shui style art by renowned landscape artist Yang Yongliang. The advertisements, titled Global Warming, Industrial Pollution, and Automotive Pollution, aimed to raise public awareness of ongoing environmental damage to China’s environment and were displayed as subway posters and full-page newspaper ads.

The ads bear a striking resemblance to traditional Chinese paintings but, when looked at closely, portray environmentally unfriendly factories, cars, and buildings littering the landscape. The campaign has been a big hit with both the public and the press. The printed ads have received a number of international awards: Cannes Lions 2009 Outdoor Silver Ads, New York Festival Awards 2009, NYF 2009 Print Gold ads.

The print ads have been adapted into an excellent animated short (see below) directed by Li Hailong from Beijing's One Production to run on air and on plasma screens in the Shanghai People Square Subway Station. The animation short was awarded the "Spikes Asia Gold Craft Spike" prize in the Category "TV - Best Use of Animation/Computer Graphics/ Special Effects" at this year's Spike Asia - Asian Advertising Festival. Additionally, the entire campaign won a number of Lotus awards at AdFest 2009, including gold for social engagement, best use of illustration, best art direction, and animation.

Apart from its mere artistic value, the campaign has also communicational and educational value: Raising public and governmental awareness might be the first step towards change. The campaign's worth is to be seen in the fact that, it manages to highlight the threat that ignorance represents to cultural identity by making use of aesthetic cues charged with traditional value.

Li, a graduate of the Beijing Film Academy with a degree in animation, told us he did not try to solely address environmental issues but also social ones as well: "The campaign expresses a societal attitude change with respect to the concept of "survival" – it activates an "environmental mindset" by addressing motives deeply rooted in everyone's psyche: the universal drive for continuance and the desire for a comfortable life." Li explained that he made use of exaggerated imagery in order to emphasize the lack of space and suffocation people are confronted with today in China – a phenomenon, he says, that leads to increased levels of societal anxiety, confusion, and ultimately, a redefinition of necessity that exploits nature and replaces it with artificial substitutes.

Bravo JWT and One Production.

I would like to thank Hailong for his interview, patience and helpful comments.

profile: li hui

I have recently had the great honor to "chat" with a wonderful photographer: Li Hui, who is, just like her photographs, quite mysterious. She started shooting with her first SLR film camera in 2008 but it wasn‘t until February 2009 that she realized she wanted to take photography seriously: taking pictures on a regular basis, selecting them and uploading them on Flickr. Ever since, her work experienced increasing popularity on the internet and has received amazing feedback, as well as coverage by various blogs (e.g. Feaverish Fotography Blog), websites (e.g. interview on artist's space on Fjord or Color Me In) and ezines (e.g. Carpaccio Magazine).

One of the main sources of inspiration for her photography is music: She likes to listen to freak-folk and ambiental sounds, as it helps her get into a certain state of mind. Equally inspiring are coming-of-age movies: „Innocence, originality, the angles from which they see the world, their natural talent“, is what fascinates her about a child‘s perspective. This is most likely the reason why she tries to keep a childlike heart herself.

Li Hui has spent a great part of her childhood with her grandfather, who was a very quiet and reserved person. On her Flickr page, I have noticed that the very first photograph that she has added, was a landscape picture taken by him. In a comment on that photograph she reveals that he was a poet and writer. „We had a similar personality. He taught me how to focus on my own world.“

Her work is emotional, unsophisticated and sincere. But what I find most intriguing about her photography is the anonymity of her representations of people. Faces are a means of direct communication. Interestingly however, Li Hui manages to convey the inherent beauty of the people portrayed by concealing their identity. „I keep trying to create something new in my work, and I'm really tired of people taking portraits." What I love most about Li Hui's work is that it manages to speak to me in a very intimate fashion, somehow mirroring past and potential experiences.