Interview of Yanting Jiang, by Fiona Guo

     侵蚀/Invasion (2018)

Q: Who are you and what you do?

A: My name is Yanting Jiang. I am a visual art student. I do all mediums of visual art but drawing most of the time.

Q: What’s your background?

A: I grew up in China, Chongqing city. My parents are not visual artists but they support what I do. Around when I was 3, I grew an interest in drawing with influences from animation, cartoon, etc. I started out mimicking styles from other artists especially form comic books. I then self-taught myself using the tablet for digital drawing but I still prefer drawing by hand.

Q: Favourite or most inspirational place?

First, I really enjoy going to the art gallery downtown. They sometimes feature artists that I am familiar with or art that intrigues me. I feel informed by the art gallery as they show me art that I like but by artists who I have yet to know their name. Otherwise, I enjoy going to natural sceneries such as lakes and forests. They give a calming sensation and is a good place for me to destress.

轮回/Reincarnation (2018)

Q: What makes you angry?

A: I hate actions such as copying or taking credits for other people’s works and actions of disrespect such appropriation. In my opinion, if you don’t understand the contexts of an art piece you don’t have the right to criticize the art. As an artist, I also dislike other artist’s low efforts towards their own art work. Time and effort are needed to research for background information and brainstorming for a good idea. If the art is bad due to low effort, it shouldn’t be considered as art at all. Artists should earn their respects from equal amounts of hard work.

Q: What do you dislike about your work?

A: Not enough creativity. I am always striving to be more different and looking for new ideas. I have limited materials to work with and, not using that as an excuse, but I always want to expand my medium towards something that I’ve never worked with before. For example, I want to work more with clay and sculptures, like 3D visual arts.

群雄逐鹿/Those who chase after the Deer (2018)

Those who chase after the Deer is a Chinese idiom about the political warfare which opened the Three Kingdom Era. The ‘Deer’ refers to the throne lost by the Qin Dynasty, which caused many forces to raise at once.