Last Updated on August 9, 2024
We recently caught up with the talented Ruby Leyi Yang, a visual artist who divides her time between China and San Francisco. She is known for her painterly abstract paintings, her neon signage artworks, her printmaking works, and her performance art. She is a BFA graduate of the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, and has a MFA from the San Francisco Art Institute. She has shown at various art galleries across the US, including Vanitas Contemporary in Los Angeles, Yiwei Gallery, Gallery All, Sullivan Gallery in Chicago, and the Hive Center for Contemporary Art in Beijing.She has been featured in New York Weekly. Celeb Mix, Yahoo and the California Herald.
Ruby talks to us about her inspiration, favorite art movements, and the art of poetry in paintings.
What inspires you about living in San Francisco?
Ruby Leyi Yang: I had a residency in upstate New York for a while and when living there found a lot of people told me I shouldn’t miss out on San Francisco. After moving there and completing my MBA I have grown to love the city. There is a beautiful vibrancy to the nature of San Francisco, and I also love the weather. It lends itself to creativity and makes me want to be outside. Most importantly though, I find that the easy connection to nature is what inspires me the most, the proximity to water as well as the forest help to spark my creativity.
What is the meaning behind your neon sign piece?
I like to write my thoughts down in my notebook, it is a place where I can turn whenever I have an idea or just want to jot down something interesting I’ve seen or heard. I derive inspiration from these notes, sometimes it’s just short sentences but other times it’s full poems. I like to use these quips and poems as inspiration for my neon signs, it is always something of importance that words alone cannot describe.
Why do you put text in your paintings?
I have always wanted to test the boundaries of the power of words in my work. I have been trying different approaches to incorporate text into my paintings. I wanted to reach a state where the text has meaning, but also works as a composition, a shape, or even a color in the painting. Words are merely the surface of communication and I wanted to see how much I can push the bounds of imagination. By including text and pondering in my paintings I allow my audience’s mind to wander and create their own meaning. It is in this that I make a statement about communication, that it is open to interpretation and words are merely a portion of what is involved.
Who do you count as an inspiration as an artist?
I have always looked to Matisse as one of my main sources of inspiration. The way that he was able to work with a variety of mediums, and his use of colors is truly breathtaking. I have also derived inspiration in cubism from Picasso, and Gertrude Stein, and admire the way they can deconstruct something beyond all possible meaning and give it new light. They really push my levels of imagination to a new level. In terms of contemporary artists, Tracey Emin, Katherine Bradford, Brad Downey, and Li Bunyan are unique voices that have a way of expressing poetically the things they care about. I admire how they have balanced their personal lives and artistic pursues.
What city inspires you the most?
For me, I have three favorite cities; San Francisco, Chicago and Hong Kong. I have been lucky to have traveled the world and seen many great cities. I like to think of myself as a dandelion, being swept wherever the wind takes me. In each city, I have a new experience, something that inspires me and deepens my understanding and fascination with the world. If I was forced to choose I would say San Francisco, Chicago, and Hong Kong speak the most to me, as places that have incredible culture only matched by wonderful cuisine. These cities have provided me with a tapestry of sights, smells and sounds that I can use for my art, and I look forward to finding new inspirations in places I have yet been.
What is your latest painting series about?
My latest painting series tackles the idea of home. With my artwork I like to play with spaces on canvas, and in this latest series I also delve into the idea of what is inside and what is outside. My artwork often tends towards my thoughts about what the meaning of home really is.
Can you talk about your printmaking work?
I love printmaking. It is the total opposite process of my daily creation. It needs to be more planned and precise. Just like creating a neon sign, printmaking is also something that is both craft and art. Both these mediums have been used in commercial art and media. I have a variety of experience in working with printmaking, from wood relief, to etching, dry point, screen printing and lithography. My favorite type of printmaking is lithography. It is for sure a time consuming dedication. I love how the weight of the press eventually subtly changes the size or the thickness of the paper. I think time being a medium in the process makes it really romantic.
Why is it important to incorporate poetry into your artwork?
Poetry and visual art can create a dynamic dialogue between different forms of expression. They can complement each other, with the words of the poem influencing the interpretation of the visual elements, and vice versa. I see poetry as a form of art with language and sound. I like to explore different aspects of visual art and test the potential of my works.
How has your Chinese background influenced your artwork?
It truly gives me different perspectives because I get to explore logics and meanings of words through a different language. I really enjoy that part.
What’s your favorite period from art history?
I love the Fluxus art movement from the 1960s, the Arte Povera movement from Italy, and the Dada art movement in Europe from the 1920s. They all are experimental in nature, and I love these art movements because they brought something new to the landscape of the art world – they all incorporated poetry, one way or another.
What is next for you, upcoming?
I will be making more neon pieces (where I write my poems in different materials) and more performance pieces this year. It’s been a while since I last traveled (due to the pandemic). I am traveling back to China and hopefully other countries this year. I’m really excited to see what travel brings to my creation. I am planning on having a solo show next year with Swim Gallery in San Francisco.
Has fashion influenced you, in any way?
One particular Alexander McQueen runway show left a profound impact on my perspective of fashion. The British fashion designer’s Spring 2001 Ready-to-Wear collection, which he called “Voss” blew my mind. The runway was very complete, it was like a theater play. It incorporated fashion, installation, performance, sound, and video.The audience sat around a glass box showing a padded room (mimicking the walls of a mental asylum), inside which models were frantically running around, with another dirty glass box in the center, which was filled with butterflies and a large naked woman attached to a medical machine. It was art.
Check out Ruby Leyi Yang’s artwork at https://www.leyi-yang.com/
