We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Luzhen Qiu. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Luzhen below.

Hi Luzhen, thanks for joining us today. Can you talk to us about a project that’s meant a lot to you?

As a Chinese American artist living in metro Detroit, my works are searching ways of bridging two cultures. After I’ve been living in metro Detroit for 24 years, I realized that I’d been obsessed to the Great Lakes since the first time I visited Lake Superior. The rocks, the stories of the shipwrecks at the bottom of the Great Lakes, and water… all goes into my fantasy. It is my soul, my dream, and my destiny. I found that creating work with monotype is a way to express my dream of the Great Lakes. In China, rocks were believed to have a concentrated amount of natural energy and symbolized the dwelling places of the Daoist immortals. Rockeries is one of the Chinese garden design elements. In my “Ode to a Nightingale” series, I build my own rockies with my drawings and monotype. I draw with different brush strokes or making monotypes with sumi ink and watercolor, then, cut the drawings or monotypes piece by piece and reassembling them to make collage on a wood panel. During the process. I adjust the values with the acrylic. My dream fantasies of the Great Lakes and rockeries are fused together into my dreamscapes during the working process.

Luzhen, love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?

Luzhen Qiu is a Chinese American artist living in Metro Detroit. She was born in 1971, in Hangzhou, China. She graduated from Wayne State University in Detroit with a MFA degree. Luzhen has taught art classes at Birmingham Bloomfield Art Center, Paint Creek Center for the Art in Michigan, and The National Academy of Fine Art School in China.

In her works, Luzhen is always searching for ways of dealing with contents and forms by organizing objects from chaotic contents into re-arranged forms. She is a multi-disciplinary artist working with both representational and abstract artworks. Her art media consists of oil, acyclic, color pencil, and mixed media. With her color pencil on layered mylar works, Luzhen makes a dreamscape from her memory by juxtaposing fragments of memories from her childhood, Chinese traditional fabric textiles, and old Chinese legends. Her works are visual poems with narrative content which draw the viewer into an open-ended story. Her works are layered with depth of transparency.

During her graduate studies at Wayne State University, she was the recipient of various Graduate professional scholarships as well as Art and Art history Travel Fellowship. Her graduate project, the video animation titled “Highway” was presented at Teaching, Learning& Technology Roundtable (TLTR) 5th Annual Conference, Detroit, MI .

Luzhen’s artworks have been displayed in various galleries including but not limited to the Detroit artist market; Detroit Music Hall, Galerie Camille, Hatch Art Gallery, Lansing gallery; High Art Gallery in Traverse City; An Arbor Art Center; Eastern Michigan University gallery in Ypsilantiin Michigan; Michigan Museum of New Art; Touch stone gallery in DC; Farmington Museum in New Mexico; art gallery in China Academy of Fine Art School… Her work has earned her a host of a lots of awards including the first place of the 2005 Canton art show , MI; the second place of the “2016 Silver medal Exhibition” in Scarab club in Detroit MI; the third place of “ 2003 The Annual All Media Exhibition” in Ann Arbor Art Center in MI; third place, “Multiculturalism In Art”, Waterford Cultural Council, MI; the honorable mention at the 7th National Annual All-Media Exhibition in Touch Stone Gallery in Washington, DC She is the recipient of the artist grants for Vermont artist residencies… In the past, Luzhen also had her solo show at Paint Creek Center for the Art in MI , Rochester, MI, Three River, MI, Huntington Woods, MI, the Art of Frame Gallery in Troy, MI. …

For you, what’s the most rewarding aspect of being a creative?

connecting more people who are loving art.

Is there mission driving your creative journey?

to learn how to tell stories in visual ways.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.luzhenqiu.art
• Instagram: luzhen_qiiu
• Facebook: Luzhen Qiu

Image Credits
Luzhen Qiu