RUOHAN WANG'S SURREAL WORLDS

RW: I started doing commission work when I was in college, and those early practical experiences helped me a lot in my further process. I didn't have long-term plans at the time, because I still wanted to try out different things. Focusing on one thing at a time has always led me to new opportunities.

I studied visual communication and illustration, which for me is a discipline between design and fine art, and I could always choose between the two. There are a lot of opportunities to combine those disciplines, and I really like switching back and forth between design and art. I think social media has made the field between those disciplines popular and, therefore, blurs the line between fine art and design. It makes the art market more inclusive and diverse.

RW: When I first started studying, I wanted to create a signature character, which I could then use in various scenes and designs. The first thing I thought of was my father's retro hairstyle from the early 2000s: an Asian man with a slicked back hairstyle. For some time, I experimented with some animation and video art, and I've since fallen in love with animation on 90s RGB TVs and giant projected screens. They have some lovely clumsiness and roughness to them, but that's exactly the sense of color and texture I like. I was also fascinated by traditional screen-printing techniques. I tried various ways to produce similar effects on computer displays, wall projections, art prints, and paintings to make them look like a sequence.

Since I graduated, I have taken on various commissions and done a lot of personal projects, and I found that all the works could be merged without a clear demarcation. They are both social and personal. So, this has naturally formed the tone of my work, from the big cosmic space and time to the small details of life, all about co-existence and the inner being of individuals.

RW: To me, shifting through different media makes work fun and dynamic. I aim to connect all of my work, so you can often find recurring elements in my work. Whether it's illustration, painting, sculpture, visual art, or NFTs, my process always starts with a manual sketch.

When doing an illustration, I transfer it into digital, where I make the final touches. My painting process is also based on a sketch and various color combinations that I try out before bringing it onto the canvas. During coloring, I test the possibility of overlaying many different fluorescent colors, so that the final picture looks dazzling, with the color relationship remaining harmonious. In general, I want to maintain a balance between female and male, strong and weak, bitter and sweet, serious and humorous.

Visual art and NFTs offer lots of possibilities to explore and experiment with me. For visual art, I like combining animations with sound, light, and temperature sensors, while for NFTs, animation with bright colors is my first choice. I like doing cross-disciplinary experiments and extending the possibilities of painting art to new media.

RW: I wanted a running person at my work, but not a full human being – just the legs were enough. I started subtracting for my characters and started "dismantling" people. It seems that artists are always trapping themselves in their roles, trying to avoid making art easy to understand. In my perception, those instinctive acts of human behavior like walking, smiling, or touching each other should be praised more by art.

Generally, I’m influenced by Chinese, German, and world culture. I sometimes get a little confused, so I take stock after observing what is right, what is the best way, and what is the universal language. I want to explore the commonality of human beings beyond culture and language and stand in the perspective of the universe to see the relationship between the individual and the universe, the world, nature, and the relationship between you and me. This is often seen in ancient Chinese paintings, with big mountains, big rivers, big trees, and tiny individuals looking up at the sun, moon, and stars.

When studying at Udk Berlin, I learned various traditional printing techniques and principles at Klasse Wagenbreth, such as screen printing, woodblock printing, etc. What makes them special is the possibility to experiment with different color and texture overlays. For example, fluorescent colors make the overlays more effective, so I started to try to apply the traditional printing techniques and principles of color usage to my digital works and paintings, making them transparent, luminous, and harmonious.

RW: In my images, I’m trying to find the balance between those two poles. I want to build a door between the reality we live in and surreal worlds, thereby building a connection between the external and the internal world. I’m aiming to not be bored by the external reality surrounding me but also not to be completely lost in surrealism.

RW: When self-doubts arise, it means I need to upgrade my abilities to create. I then find relief in my practice. The process of creating a painting is unpredictable, but I have trust that it will look good in the end.

RW: I believe when art triggers any kind of emotion within the viewer, then it has achieved its goal – no matter what level of understanding it is based on. With my work, I want to increase the viewer’s dopamine with the bright scenes shown in my pieces. In a world full of uncertainty, art can play a very important role by inviting the viewer to escape the everyday.

RW: Social media, for me, is all about output and input. I enjoy sharing my creative process, finished works, and nonsense. It’s a place where we, as artists, can share our work and increase our visibility. Social media expands the groups I follow, the topics I care about, and it makes me more inclusive and deepens my understanding of individuals. All of this influences the content of my artworks in the end, as there are many commonalities worth exploring on social media.

RW: I have big personal dreams to fulfill that are best left unsaid right now. In the near future, I wish for more efficiency in my work and that I can devote more time to creating rather than being busy with things I am not good at. I’m dreaming of a big solo exhibition in Berlin soon.