YEOJA Mag - Yuge Zhou

Yuge Zhou

Interview with the video artist

At the age of five, Yuge Zhou (周雨歌) (she/her) became a household name in China as the singer for a popular children’s TV series. Since then, she has moved to the US, received her degree in Computer Science, and turned her attention towards video art and installations.

Zhou’s work deals with themes of connections, isolation, and longing across urban and natural environments through immersive experiences created through a combination of sculptural reliefs and digital collaging. YEOJA Mag sat down with the artist to chat about her work:

YEOJA Mag - Yuge Zhou
Visuals provided by Yuge Zhou

A metaphorical description of your videos, for example “Soft Plots” where you depict  people on the beach, could be “an entity seeing the same space in different times and from varying perspectives”. It results in a narration that has its location as the only common denominator. In your videos, an unusual thing happens the individuals’ fates become non-relatable, almost irrelevant, and the landscape becomes the narrator. Your work can be seen as a non-linear, meditative narration with no beginning or ending. Do you prefer meditation to catharsis?
Yuge Zhou: I prefer meditation which reflects my Chinese upbringing and that obviously shows in my work. Rooted in Chinese philosophy, meditation seeks to find peace beneath the turbulence of daily life. My aesthetics is also influenced by traditional Chinese scroll paintings which illustrate a compressed narrative, multiple events from different times and perspectives happening simultaneously.

YEOJA Mag - Yuge Zhou
Visuals provided by Yuge Zhou

The way you alter scale and arrangement of the pieces of your video collages gives your installations an uncanny aura. The situations seem familiar, almost ordinary. For example, a distanced perspective of people playing volleyball on the beach. However, this perception changes with the second look. A ball is kicked only to disappear at the edge of the frame, and a volleyball player waves into a void. Is this uncanny, fragmented and compressed narration your perception/reflection on the masses?
Yuge Zhou: The volleyball scene you mentioned was filmed in the summer on the Oak Street beach in Chicago. These activities formed by pseudo communities speak to me about the fragmented existence of urban life. It portrays a conception of urban living that is both group-oriented and discontinuous, with underlying conflicts and competitions. Every day, we encounter many incomplete, fragmented narratives. In the public spaces of a metropolis with dense populations, this is recognised as an integral aspect. And that, I believe, is why cities attract both new inhabitants and tourists. In many ways, we live in big cities like we live in small towns — except that our communities are scattered across a dense network of other storied lives of which we only catch a glimpse.

YEOJA Mag - Yuge Zhou
Visuals provided by Yuge Zhou

Your art always shows a perspective that is distanced and distorted. Do you think “truth” is more about realising the distortedness of the bigger picture than scrutinising the messed up details?
Yuge Zhou: It’s a little bit of both, depending on your vantage point. If I’m filming from a high-rise building, I’m interested in capturing the disposition of a place and its flow of activities from an expansive perspective. But sometimes when I’m filming a crowd on the street, I’m more inclined to zoom in on the details of the scenes, as I’m no longer a detached observer but a participant. 

“When the east of the day meets the west of the night” is a particularly strong piece in our opinion. It highlights a problem of the modern world that is very difficult to put in words or images; that things happen simultaneously but we have different perspectives on them. Can you share more thoughts about this work?
Yuge Zhou: This project was inspired by conversations with my mother, who lives in Beijing, about the physical and emotional distances between us. I found myself longing for home and realising that both countries are my home. That brought up this picture in my mind of two figures standing on the edge of the Pacific Ocean, contemplating and looking out towards each other at the same moment, feeling a connection despite the physical distance. The work was filmed in one continuous take in two locations near my previous homes in Beijing and California from both sides of the Pacific Ocean. The cameras slowly move laterally as the sun descends and ascends in two skies to create an arc-shaped trajectory.

YEOJA Mag - Yuge Zhou
Visuals provided by Yuge Zhou

We like the word play in the title: “When the East of the day meets the West of the night”. It’s the day of the west and the night of the east that meet but you chose to rephrase it. Are you commenting on the different perspectives our respective location gives us?
Yuge Zhou: On a more literal level, I filmed the sunrise in China (East) and sunset in America (West), which made me decide to pair East with day and West with night. It also represents the ideological differences that we have. But in the work, the sun from two locations merges at one point as the color palette of the ocean is transformed from contrasting complementary colours into a unified color scheme. That moment represents my desire for a world in harmony and shared commonality.

YEOJA Mag - Yuge Zhou
Visuals provided by Yuge Zhou

Why did you choose images and not words to express your artistic viewpoint?
Yuge Zhou: Constantly having to switch between two languages (Chinese and English) made me realise the limitation of verbal discourse to express feelings and emotions, especially for people that come from different cultural backgrounds. Images to me are more universal vehicles for communication.

First you studied under Chinese contemporary painter Kaixi Cui. Then you went to the Art Institute of Chicago. What was it like learning under Kaixi Cui in comparison to learning at art school? Can you share some of your experiences?
Yuge Zhou: I studied with Kaixi Cui when I was still very young. I focused mostly on techniques of drawing and traditional landscape paintings. He cultivated my interest in visual arts. But the Art Institute of Chicago taught me conceptual and critical thinking, and introduced me to a contemporary realm of art making. So at this point, I discovered my lifelong passion for time-based art and installations.

YEOJA Mag - Yuge Zhou
Visuals provided by Yuge Zhou

In some of your interviews you talk about the friction of moving to the U.S to study. Can you elaborate on how temporary discomfort gives you a unique perspective as an artist? We ask this because moving to a new place results sometimes in the feelings of depression, confusion or just a lack of motivation. Did it take a while until you were able to invoke your new experiences into your art? Or are you just a natural born talent?
Yuge Zhou: I moved to the U.S. originally to go to Syracuse University to get a Master’s degree in Technology. I was also interested in experiencing a very different culture to counterbalance my Chinese heritage, and motivated to explore and transform myself into a hybrid of two cultures. I made a conscious effort to make friends outside of my school community and I also worked to master the language. At the same time, I picked up a camera and started shooting. It wasn’t calculated, and was almost happenstance. Making art became a type of therapy and I was energised to recreate myself.

The friction and discomfort from living in a foreign land inspired new ideas of expression. For example, I sought ways to explore such themes as individuality versus communality in American society. This led me to pursue an MFA at the School of the Art Institute in Chicago where I was able to fuse artistic concepts with the logic associated with technological innovation.

YEOJA Mag - Yuge Zhou
Visuals provided by Yuge Zhou

On a broader note, you have the experience of having to literally make the East and the West meet in your head. What did you think are ideological aspects that are particularly difficult to combine?
Yuge Zhou: The basic ideological differences between Asian and Western societies remind us that we have to work hard to build bridges of understanding and communication. It’s particularly difficult to persuade people to consider lives that are so different from their own. Art is one way to bridge these gaps.

They say that western society is more focused on individuality whilst the east with its communist past and present highlights the collective as a paradigm. What is your personal opinion on that and does it radiate through your art in any way?
Yuge Zhou: In Eastern thinking, there is more community orientation versus the individuality of the West. In my work, I’ve explored both communities and individual behaviours. Sometimes one system works better than the other. There’s no right or wrong; both can be embraced and balanced at the same time.

YEOJA Mag - Yuge Zhou
Visuals provided by Yuge Zhou

Your video collages seem like a lot of work, as everything is so perfectly timed and positioned, as well as being well thought-out and at times humorous. What software do you have to work with to combine this many videos and how long does it take to render?
Yuge Zhou: I use Adobe After Effects to edit my video collages. It normally takes a few days to render a video but much longer to edit. I always consider my work as a “moving painting”. Therefore the editing software is akin to paint brushes for me. 

The colour palette in your work, “Magic Hours” gives us Wes Anderson vibes, and the perspective used in “Pale Patrol the Humors” is a bit like what was used by (the Renaissance artist) Pieter Bruegel. You also reference Chinese scroll paintings as an inspiration. Is there any other example you can name as an influence to your aesthetic?
Yuge Zhou: Among the several street photographers that influenced my work were Henri Cartier-Bresson and Walker Evans. Their work led me to think about the human condition. I liked the way they captured the powerful moments when the visual and psychological elements in real-life scenes spontaneously and briefly come together in perfect resonance. A contemporary influence is Icelandic performance artist Ragnar Kjartansson. I love how he deconstructs and reconstructs sound, visuals and space, for his multi-channel video and sound installations. 
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Images provided by Yuge Zhou. To follow Yuge Zhou on Instagram, click here. For more interviews, click here.