Rachel Liu / Selected work

Volunteering gave me the opportunity to get to know and grow close to autistic children. During our time together, I looked into their eyes to sense their emotions and tried to convey friendliness through my own gaze. Our eyes became a way of sharing feelings beyond words.

In this project, I brought together eye-shaped wooden panels freely painted by the children and three-dimensional eyes I created using mixed media. This collaborative work conveys the flow of emotions between us and my hope that they will be seen by more and more people.

Draft: how the collaboration is described is still being confirmed with Rachel.

Credit and permission to show these panels to be confirmed.

Over the past few years, I have faced many unfamiliar situations and challenges. These experiences made me realize that growth comes from choosing not to withdraw and continuing to make the decisions I believe are right. Through this project, I wanted to thank the past version of myself who had the courage to keep moving forward.

Inspired by Rhizomatiks’ transformation of bodily movement into data and visual language, I designed a digital character representing my past self, based on old photographs and an idealized vision of myself. Through choreography, live-action filming, motion capture, character animation, and visual effects, I brought my past and present selves together to perform the same dance. The performance reflects on my personal experiences while recognizing and expressing gratitude for the perseverance and courage behind my past choices.

I customised my trousers with brightly coloured patterns inspired by tigers, zebras, and deer, symbolising the courage, independence, gentleness, and determination I value.

Process

1. Character design
2. 3D modeling and rendering
3. Rehearsal
4. Motion capture
5. Editing
6. Final film

Watch the film · link tbc

Credits to confirm: dance teacher, 3D teacher, downloaded 3D assets, capture studio.

Draft: series title, year, media and sizes to be confirmed. Captions name what each drawing shows.

This work grew from my experience of painting alongside autistic children. Creating together helped me understand their emotions and ways of expressing themselves, while friendships developed through our shared time. Their images could be restless or quiet, fragile yet full of life.

I combined wooden panels shaped like houses, covered in vivid graffiti, with fragile plaster panels to give visual form to my impressions. Through these contrasts, I recall a world that felt both restrained and intense, where small, easily overlooked details carried emotions and images spoke in a language of their own.

Draft: wording about painting with the children to be confirmed with Rachel.

This painting series grows from my experiences of living across different cultural environments. I was born in Beijing, where local traditions, colors, patterns, and textures shaped my earliest memories. Later, life in New Jersey introduced me to new landscapes, flowers, relationships, and ways of seeing the world.

For these works, I gathered meaningful elements from both parts of my life and reimagined them on flower-shaped wooden panels. Rather than comparing cultures or emphasizing difference, the series expresses gratitude for everything that has nurtured, shaped, and enriched me, allowing memories from different places to meet, coexist, and bloom together with grace.

Cocoon is a sculpture I created by building up coils of clay. As I added each layer, moisture and gravity continually changed its form. These changes reminded me of my own growth: as the coils rose, I realized that growth itself could carry risks.

As the structure grew, it gradually became an enclosed space resembling a cocoon. Perhaps a transformation could happen within it, like a butterfly emerging from its chrysalis. I created a vine extending from the sculpture, with many leaves growing along it, to symbolize new possibilities.

How can protection and care create a life that seems reasonable yet becomes increasingly restrictive?

Across seven drawings made with colored pencils, graphite, and mixed media, I use chains, enclosed spaces, and facial expressions to explore the constraints of care without boundaries. These include parental control, grandparents’ indulgence, excessive protection at school, achievement-oriented guidance from teachers, and possessiveness or concealment among friends. Through these works, I reflect on how care can support growth while also limiting personal choice and freedom.

Series name is a working title; Rachel's board calls it AP Drawing 2025–2026.

In this project, I cast objects I have collected into plaster panels. They come from my friends, my volunteer work, my family, and a journey. Though seemingly ordinary, these objects connect me to people and feelings that matter to me. The plaster seems to give these emotions a lasting form, holding my memories and feelings like a page from a diary that is uniquely mine.

Draft: year (2025 or 2026) to be confirmed.