2023 IYAC Kyoto Exhibition Exhibiting Studios - -Xiaowei Art Studio (USA)
"Art is a body of spiritual pillars with philosophical meanings attached to guide a person throughout his or her life. It can be solidified or intangible."Art is a body of spiritual pillars with philosophical meanings attached to guide a person throughout his or her life. It can be solidified or intangible."— —Xiaowei Chen
Xiaowei Art Studio
Xiaowei Chen
Born in Beijing in 1978 and graduated from Beijing Institute of Printing in 2000, Xiaowei Chen was a visiting artist lecturer at the School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston and currently lives and works in Boston, USA.
SELECTED INDIVIDUAL EXHIBITIONS
IYAC: Could you please introduce your studio and teaching philosophy, and share how you achieved such an outstanding result in this competition?
Xiao WeiChen: First of all, I would like to thank the IYAC organizing committee for their recognition. Our studio is located in Boston USA. We are a private limited-edition art studio.
We have a total of 107 children of different ages participating in the competition, and the styles and techniques we chose for the propositions were completely different from each perspective. The children each painting is a 2-month painting process. I use different teaching methods for children from 6 to 8 years old, 8 to 13 years old and 13 to 17 years old. Kids on the younger side will probably have to spend about 18 hours, while older kids may need 36 to 45 hours to get the job done. There are also students who continue to paint on the way out. This, then, is what honors the competition and the love of art.
I think it's important for students to understand that going to a competition is different from their regular work. The competition is about the ability to think from all angles and the degree of completion of the work, and the exercise is also a comprehensive ability examination. I guide them according to their preferences and personalities, and find out the characteristics of their strokes. That's why 95% of the students so far have been selected for the final round. They have to be different in order to be selected together. Even at the age of 6, I try to develop their brain and imagination, and three-dimensional observation education is a supplementary program in my business.
IYAC: Students are lucky to be able to study under you, not only is your own work strong, but this teaching philosophy is ahead of its time.
Chen: I'm flattered! I am still struggling too. The good thing is that I don't forget the beginning, and I'm committed to my ideals. And in the United States. Their education system focuses on the ability to synthesize, coordinate and express oneself. Not the traditional Eastern way of thinking. I personally feel that the studio in this piece of education to do this, but also at the same time to help them to do the real meaning of the scene on the examination, my students are also a lot of the New York School of Visual Arts and the Royal College of Art students as well as postgraduate students, this year, some people apply for Yale and Harvard. Education in my time is worth doing a thing, do to do, can not be consumed by the desire to live.
IYAC: I received a message inquiring about the details of this work - and of course I'd like to know - what kind of material was used and how was it painted?
Chen: Fiona Chen sketched the lines first. Then she put it into the computer and drew it with Photoshop software. She drew this painting twice. It took her about fifty-eight hours to draw it. The first time was not as creative as the second time, and the background was not as good as the second time, so she changed it in the middle of the drawing. So we changed her a lot more midway through. The student is very good, very patient, and a master of all sciences. I think the painting has the feel of a classical symphony: clear, yet layered. The meaning is incremental, but also covers a kind of aspiration and endeavor for the ideal.
IYAC: This is a great analysis! Schoolmaster + teacher's guidance = magical spatial form thinking.
Chen: Haha! Thank you. Nowadays, kids are all school masters. Many of our students here draw a picture and change it for a long time. On the way all the way to learn skills at the same time the main learning is thinking ideas. Teaching is still relatively rigorous. The studio also mainly teaches paperback drawing, product design, computer drawing and design, soft sculpture and three-dimensional book production.
The Conversation
IYAC: Looking at the students' work, it feels like you teach the entire 4-year art college system, how does that work?
Chen: It's really a college program, and I have an assistant who is pretty well-rounded as well. Majoring in web design, illustration and 3-D books. I didn't teach that closely when I was a guest at the Art Institute of Boston. After all, these academics were all going to other schools later on. Taking a class like this is probably once in a lifetime. I hope they can remember it for the rest of their lives. The main thing is that I hope the students who are interested can think in multiple perspectives. Don't just think in planes.
Education, for me, is half of my life's experience. It is an accumulation of databases, mainly connected to psychology and hypnosis, and so on. The so-called education is actually a fill-in-the-blank, not just exporting one's own ability and then instilling a concept into students. Teaching and learning should be mutually supportive, trying their best to help all those who seek knowledge. Students will also gradually improve according to the caliber of the teacher's perception, giving them a broad line of thinking. This line of thinking is particularly important, and it is necessary to make a series of works to show the line of thinking. I attach great importance to this piece, and this is what an Artist should be. Thinking is mainly a concept, not an idea. Ideas and concepts are two different things.
Art is a spiritual pillar with a philosophical meaning that guides people throughout their lives. Art can be solid or invisible, solid is visible to the naked eye, and invisible is penetrating into the bone marrow.
IYAC: "Art has a philosophical significance", I want to experience and digest this art argument which is more advanced than the invisible avenue.
IYAC: What would you like to say about IYAC?
Chen: First of all, I have looked at the works of students from other organizations and found them very interesting. The most valuable thing is the sense of nature, and the images are rich in information and chewable. The judges are really good, and IYAC's competition is now at an international level, with a professional panel of judges who have different backgrounds in art practice and creative experience, and throughout the entire process I was able to see that this platform is professional, dedicated, fair, and equitable. There is a competition in the United States that is on par with your scale and in all aspects, and we often participate in that competition, but they are not international, they are in the U.S. The IYAC is an international competition, and there are exhibition opportunities. As an artist, I think exhibition opportunities are very, very important. So you should be on the whole international level, I generally speak more down-to-earth, that is to say that there is a reason to boast ah, this boast is not just boast.
Xiaowei Art Studio's Works
Hope Is Not Lost
My Brother's Metaverse
Together
Amaranthine
Calypso
Cindy LI
2023 New York IYAC TOP International Illustration Competition/Silver Award
2023 New York IYAC TOP International Illustration Competition/Silver Award
ABOUT XIAOWEI
Chen Xiaowei's work includes paintings, videos and sculptures. She explores the natural environment, natural disasters, human thought and the interconnections between the three.
Chen Xiaowei (b. 1978) graduated from Beijing Printing Institute. From 2000 to 2005, she worked in television production, producing and directing independent documentaries. She was a guest artist lecturer at the School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. She has received the Artadia Art Foundation Boston Artist Top 2 Award and Prize Sponsorship in New York and a painting program at the ISCP International Artist Residency Center in Brooklyn; The COOHAUS RESIDENCY ARTIST Residency Painting Program in New York, 2013; ARNOT ART MUSEUM OF ART, ELMIRA, NY 75th Finalist, Art in the States Competition, USA; 2019 ART OLYMPIA 2019 International Open Art Competition, Japan; Finalist, The Arte Laguna Prize International Art Competition, 2017 The Arte Laguna Prize, Nappe Arsenale and TIM Future Center Art Center, Venice, Italy, 2017; Outstanding Artist in Drawing on Paper, Manifest Press International Drawing Annual 11, Cincinnati, Ohio, USA, among others. Her recent solo exhibitions include: Boston Ci