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

Ruilin, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. Are you happy as a creative professional? Do you sometimes wonder what it would be like to work for someone else?

Happy or not, I will definitely be more in line with what my parents expect of me. Art student in China is a symbol of bad student, choose take art university exam just because you can enter better university using lower grade. This is just a microcosm of China’s abnormal education system. Even if I get good grades, I choose art just because of my personal interest, and this mark will stay with me. Even though my parents agreed to let me take painting training and take the art college entrance exam when I was in high school out of respect for their children, they never understood anything about my career. Although children are verbally taught to study diligently, what they actually believe in is relationships and unfair competition. That’s why they never tried to understand that I would have difficulties. They foolishly thought that their so-called connections and superior life meant that I shouldn’t have any pain and confusion, and they were also very sadly unable to understand their own pain and confusion. So for me, this question is not a sentimental question like “examining another road that I have never walked”. This question encompasses too many issues related to national and social systems and the resulting family trauma. I am very happy to be a creator. This is also a career that belongs to me and is suitable for me. And I will never beautify the path I did not choose, which is considered as a normal road in the environment where I grew up. This choice also helped me recognize my parents and their feelings for me very early. They love the concept of “enviable family relationships” more than me, and I can face the fact that my feelings for them are very weak. If I had a “real” job, my life would probably be a lot less troublesome, but I would be in a lot more mental pain. I will most likely become someone like my parents who are blind to their own pain and unwilling to make changes. That would be a horrible way to live.

As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?

I really start get into the industry after I came to America, which, to be honest, still not really. As an international student, I can only be employed by my school, so I don’t have clients or anything like that. I can’t promote myself like U.S. citizens can, at least not as easily as they can.
My work mainly focus on story telling. It is always the story that interested me and stories are the things I want to create. I’m currently in my third-year of MFA and my thesis will be a graphic novel. It will be a Katabasis story, the story about the journey to hell and back.
My interests are mainly focus on mythology and folklore. I’m such a fan of games, movies and comics, anything that is story-wise is my type. I prefer more serious topics such as death, mental health, or aspects of humanities that show in mythology and folklore.
I also like traditional printing since this is something brand new to me. I like working in printing lab, I enjoy the labor part of making prints so much.
https://www.ruilinnest.com/ this is my website is you need more information and my art works.

What can society do to ensure an environment that’s helpful to artists and creatives?

NO CENSORSHIP. This is the best a society can do. People often forget the value of freedom and how hard it is to attain. We should not take freedom for granted. As long as there is no cultural censorship and no societal atmosphere of mutual denunciation, people’s thoughts will naturally lead them to create all kinds of works without much effort. Thoughts are like birds destined not to be caged, with every feather shining with the light of freedom.

What’s the most rewarding aspect of being a creative in your experience?

It pushes me to continually explore myself. To me, much of people’s mental suffering and confusion comes from not knowing what they truly want. I spent 16 years of my life under the influence of a test-oriented education system. After coming to the United States and being confronted with the task of ‘finding my own voice,’ all I felt was absurdity. It was the first time I realized how difficult it is to explore oneself, and that it’s something you need to start thinking about as early as possible. It wasn’t until last year that I slowly began to get on the right track. Not only my art work improved by doing this but also my mental health. I can see my life and the problems I’m facing much clearer.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.ruilinnest.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/aislingcynthia/