Yuxiao Tian (Freja)

Yuxiao Tian is an artist and photographer from Sichuan, China, based in London.

She obtained her BA degree at the Bejing Institute of Fashion Technology in 2015. Before studying photography at the Royal College of Art, she used to be a fashion designer and buyer. The inter-professional learning experience and highly-sensitive personality have given her various new thoughts on the themes and methods of creation. Her current works focus on integrating various creative methods and art forms with photography, trying to recall some humanistic value in her works.

As an artist, my works are always inspired by my personal life experience, starting from the individual life, expanding to a social phenomenon or group, and reflecting on the relationship between individuals, systems and people.

My long-term project, 'Mailbox No.7', stemmed from my family story and revealed the significant influence of history and social systems on personal destiny and value identification. This project is time-based and consists of different parts, including reflections on the identity of industrial immigrants, the urbanization process of a country, and the relationship between humans and nature from different perspectives and times.

Because of the policy call and the particular background of the Cold War era, the fate of individuals, collectives, and countries is tightly bound together. Even after the end of the three-line construction project, it has profoundly influenced the lives and identities of three generations.

Mailbox No.7 (2022) - Photobook, inkjet print, 21x21 cm

Mailbox No.7 (2022) - Photobook, inkjet print, 21x21 cm – video preview- 2'14''

Material: Matte Inkjet Paper 165gsm

Binding: Hardcover

Page: 50

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Photo book

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21x21 cm

Mailbox No.7-Home/Land (2021)- Giclée, 50x40cm

This land used to be my home for more than ten years. It used to be a factory. It was a part of employee housing in the factory for industrial migrants from all over China 30 years ago. After the demolition, new commercial housing buildings will be built on this land. Several years later, it will be a ruin again. Our civilization and urbanization process are also in this loop: continuous construction, demolition, and reconstruction with development. This process is not only reflected in the relationship between humans and land but also between people and people.

As the third generation of industrial immigrants, the factory I grew up in has spanned China's planned economic era and market economy era. It has also experienced development from nothing, from prosperity to decline, and the factory's people and things have gradually faded.

Sixty years ago, people gathered from all over China to build this factory on a wasteland. As the factory boomed and waned until it disappeared, people gradually left here, scattered around the world. In the process of urbanization, the connections between people and people, people and the land, are gradually disappearing.

Medium:

digital print

Mailbox No.7-A memory of 3 generations(2022)- sound track cover

Mailbox No.7-A memory of 3 generations(2022)- sound track – English Ver.- 7'57'' Sichuan dialect Ver.-6'51''

Mailbox No.7-A memory of 3 generations(2022)- sound track text –

Medium:

Sound

Size:

6'51'' （Sichuan dialect Ver.) 7'57'' (English Ver.)

Disorder- 384 trigrams (2022)- Giclée, 320x480cm

Disorder- 64 hexagrams (2022)- Giclée, 160x160 cm

Disorder- final (2022)- Giclée, 20x20cm

Disorder (2022)- video, 1080P HD, 1'42''

The project titled 'disorder' concept is to visualize the philosophical deconstruction of the word 'disorder'. This deconstruction steamed from an ancient Chinese philosophical thought based on the duality non-opposition concept of 'yin and yang. The word disorder is composed of the root order and the affix dis-. Its essence is to create words based on a perspective of an opposite relationship. I visualized this concept in black and white and was inspired by the Tai Chi Diagram in < I Ching > to visualize my understanding of the word 'disorder' in the way of Six-Trigrams divination in the book. In < I Ching>, things in the world are summarized into 64 hexagrams.

'Six-Trigrams' is a divination that attempts to predict an uncertain future by randomly tossing coins in a specific system. This seemingly contradictory approach can see the randomness and regularity system as 'disorder' and 'order'. I painted the front and back of the coins in black and white, then tossed them to get random patterns; every six trigrams can be combined into a hexagram. I visualized all the 384 trigrams in the <I Ching> through this method, obtained the patterns of 64 hexagrams by post-processing, and synthesized them into a final image. This image reflects 'disorder', which needs a system "order" to embody its characteristics, which is opposite and interdependent with 'order'.

Medium:

print making, digital scanning

Artistic eastern philosophy post processing Printmaking

Yuxiao Tian (Freja)

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About

Royal College of Art