Philip Tinari: what can be unburdened by what has been.
Philip Tinari, director, UCCA Center for Contemporary Art, born in Philadelphia, USA. He has lived and worked in Beijing from 2001. He holds degrees from Duke and Harvard. Since coming to UCCA in 2011, Philip Tinari has led its transformation from a founder-owned private museum into an accredited museum across multiple locations, a public foundation, and a family of art-driven enterprises. During his tenure, UCCA has mounted more than seventy exhibitions and thousands of public programs, bringing artistic voices established and emerging, Chinese and international, to an audience of over a million visitors each year.
fabric qorn: you just love until you and the beloved become one.
fabric qorn is a contemporary fashion brand that intricately weaves traditional Chinese aesthetics with modern design elements. Founded by Zhao Chenxi, a graduate of the University of California, Davis, with a major in Fashion Design and a minor in Textile Science, the brand encapsulates the cultural awakening and ex ploration of a new generation of Chinese in a Westernized world. fabric qorn is renowned for its unique approach to fashion, where each collec tion is a dialogue between past and present, tradition and innovation. The brand draws inspiration from the rich tapestry of Chinese cultural heritage, integrating elements such as vintage household items and traditional motifs, and reinterprets them through a modern lens. This synthesis creates designs that are both nostal gically familiar and refreshingly contemporary.
Anouchka van Driel: do not fear time.
Anouchka van Driel, curator, born in Rotterdam, the Netherlands. She graduated with a bachelor’s degree in design from ArtEZ University of Arts and a master’s degree in Visual Sociology from Goldsmiths, University of London. Now she works between Beijing, China, and The Hague, the Netherlands. Anouchka has been lived and workd in China for over a decade, developing art and design projects that stimulate dialogue and experimentation between creative disciplines and cultures. She has contributed to the success of numerous creative projects with partners including among others the Embassy of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, Dutch Design Fashion Architecture, UCCA, the City of Amsterdam, and Beijing Design Week.
Pixy Liao: women do have balls … inside.
Pixy Liao, photographer, born in 1979 in Shanghai, China. She currently lives and works in Brooklyn, New York. Liao received her MFA in photography from the University of Memphis in 2008. Her work is often witty and humorous. She uses her photographs, video and installation to call into question stereotypical contemporary concepts such as the nature of “ the couple,” “the artist,” and the “female experience.” Liao is a recipient of several awards, such as the NYFA Fellowship in Photography, Santo Foundation Individual Artist Awards, and the Madame Figaro Women Photographers Award, etc.
Wu Junyong: the artist is the thermometer of the times.
Wu Junyong, artist, born in 1978 in Putian, China. He currently lives and works in Hangzhou. He earned his bachelor’s and master’s degrees from China Academy of Art in 2000 and 2005, respectively. Wu Junyong’s creative works come in various forms, including animation theater, painting, improvised tattoos, and the internet. His works are marked by unique textual and visual games, intertwined with reinterpretations of fables, legends, myths, and allusions. In a creative manner, he explores the absurdity present in contemporary society and political life, using imagery to release the struggles and dilemmas embedded within these absurd landscapes.
Hong Shaopei: no wife no life.
Hong Shaopei, artist, born in 1979 in Taiwan, China. He currently works and lives in Beijing. He graduated from Taipei Normal University with a bachelor’s degree in Art and Art Education in 2007. Hong Shaopei has long delved into the essence of painting by layering acrylic paint, aiming to expand the possibilities of painting from traditional two-dimensional space to a three-dimensional presentation. The stacked and constantly reshaped paint forms a three-dimensional surface, transforming flat paintings into three-dimensional ones.
Charley Kan: be the cherry on top, not the cake.
Charley Kan, General Manager of Content at Publicis Groupe China. He has held key positions at various 4A companies, including JWT, BBDO, and MEC, and has long served leading brands in the luxury travel, high-end automotive, and 3C industries. His work for IKEA Beijing was shortlisted at the Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity. As a graduate of the first class of the Fashion Design program at China Textile University (now Donghua University), he entered China’s first joint venture 4A company, Dentsu Young & Rubicam (DY&R), and has since dedicated himself to the Chinese advertising industry, amassing over 30 years of marketing experience.
You Yang: culture on exhibiting.
You Yang, Director of X Museum and a member of its Board of Directors. He previously served as the Art Director of UCCA Group and the Deputy Director of UCCA Ullens Center for Contemporary Art. You Yang closely follows the dynamics and integration of urban and consumer culture. He has held various roles, including arts institution manager, columnist, curator, art management lecturer, and public relations and marketing expert. He focuses on contemporary museum theory, exploring collaborative research projects across cultural fields, public art projects, and government cooperation projects.
chenchenchen: my best contemporary art piece is transforming myself into a collector.
chenchenchen, artist, born in 1987 in Hangzhou, China. He graduated from the Total Art Department of China Academy of Art with a bachelor’s degree in 2010; Graduated from the Total Art studio of the Inter-media College with a master’s degree in 2013, under the tutelage of Qiu Zhijie; Graduated from the Department of Philosophy of Capital Normal University with a doctor’s degree in 2022, under the tutelage of Professor Chen Jiaying. He is a cross-border artist who dabbles in contemporary art, music, comics and virtual worlds, and is committed to the fusion of contemporary art and music; He is also a cultural & technology entrepreneur who founded the digital content team OXYZ3.
Ruben Lundgren: “Great idea! What’s the budget?”
Ruben Lundgren, photographer and curator, born in 1983 in the Netherlands. He currently works and lives in Beijing. He graduated from China Central Academy of Fine Arts in 2011. He made a name within the conceptual photography duo WassinkLundgren with publications as Empty Bottles (2007) and Tokyo Tokyo (2010). FOAM showed a retrospect of their work in 2013. He works as a photojournalist for Dutch newspaper De Volkskrant and as an independent curator of Chinese photography. Together with Martin Parr, he co-edited The Chinese Photobook (2015). Other publications include Hlleo? (2018) and MeNu (2018) a tasty collection of Chinese vernacular food photography.
Song Ta: retired at 30 years old.
Song Ta, artist, born in 1988 in Guangdong, China and graduated from Guangzhou Academy of Fine Arts in 2010. He received the Asian Cultural Council Grant from the Rockefeller Foundation in New York, USA in 2015. He received the Paulo Cunha e Silva Art Award from the Porto City Council in Portugal in 2020. Recent solo exhibitions include: “Song Ta Visits Taiwan” (Hy-phen Art Center, Taipei, 2022), “Hanfu Architecture + Gel Pen Calligraphy” (Zhiwu, Shanghai, 2021), “Song Ta’s Paintings: 1999-2020” (Beijing Commune, Beijing, 2020), etc. His works have been exhibited in many contemporary art institutions, including the National Museum of Indonesia; Julia Stoschek Collection Foundation in Düsseldorf, Germany; Nassau Kunstverein in Wiesbaden, Germany; Ullens Center for Contemporary Art in Beijing, etc.
Lin Zhipeng: when all the light comes to you.
Lin Zhipeng (aka No.223), photographer, born in 1979 in Guangdong, China. He graduated from Guangdong University of Foreign Studies with major of financial English. Lin Zhipeng is a photographer and freelancer writer based in Beijing. Created in 2003, his blog “North Latitude 23” where he published everyday pictures accompanied by short texts received millions views and made him famous among the web community. Presented for years in group exhibitions in China and abroad , Lin’s works have also been the object of several solo shows both nationally and internationally ( Delaware Contemporary Museum ; Walther Collection Ulm ; De Sarthe Gallery Beijing ; Stieglitz19 Gallery Antwerp ; M97 Gallery Shanghai, etc). He has published photography books in China, France, Canada, Japan and Italy.
Christine Low: be a BLESSING, not a BURDEN.
Christine Low, fashion show director, born in 1963 in Malaysia, she currently works and lives in Shanghai. A former model who has been walking the runway in Asia and Europe in late 80s till mid 90s, her footprint in the industry has helped shape and mold her into an interesting soul who has eyes for beauty and ears for all sorts of melodies! She is an all-rounded show director and a pioneer in Show Production field in greater China since 1999, and joined Activation Group in 2011 as a partner in charge of the event division in Shanghai. She is an experienced executive director with numerous experiences overseeing a executive/talent/creative team.