Meet Qingyang (tiffany) Zhu

We were lucky to catch up with Qingyang (tiffany) Zhu recently and have shared our conversation below.

Qingyang (Tiffany), so excited to have you with us today. So much we can chat about, but one of the questions we are most interested in is how you have managed to keep your creativity alive.

Creativity is a very important part as an illustrator, and how to keep the ability of creation is also an eternal question for many illustrator. For me, first of all, is gain as much as the information, such as reading, watching movie, documentaries, literature, music, travel etc, so that the inspiration can be stimulated. Personal inspiration is limited because everyone is restricted by their own experience, so know more about the outside world will help us to gain the creativity. Secondly, always try new things and be curious. It can not only challenge myself, which requires me to step out from my comfort zone, but also give me new ideas while I’m experimenting new things. For example, while I’m trying new medias or techniques, I always have the feeling of developing a new land. Curiosity is also an important part of an illustrator. It keeps me to explore the things I have never tried.

Appreciate the insights and wisdom. Before we dig deeper and ask you about the skills that matter and more, maybe you can tell our readers about yourself?

I’m an illustrator based in Shanghai and Providence, also a senior illustration student in Rhode Island School of Design. I focus on children illustrations, picture books and editorial illustrations most. I really enjoy with story-telling illustrations because it combines both drawing and literatures. What excites me most about being an illustrator is the ability to tell stories visually, creating art that resonates with people on a personal level. I love to play with traditional media, such as mix media, collage, and so on. I’m also a person who really love colors. In my artworks, I hope audience can have the experience of immersing themself in the world I created. At the same time, I also pay attention to the emotion link with my illustrations and the real world. I hope to use my artworks to empathy with people. I love bringing ideas to life through playful, whimsical characters or more detailed, emotional illustrations. Recently, I’m working on my picture books about the relationship between mother and child.

Looking back, what do you think were the three qualities, skills, or areas of knowledge that were most impactful in your journey? What advice do you have for folks who are early in their journey in terms of how they can best develop or improve on these?

The three impactful things in my journey is the foundations of skills, reading and keep experimenting. These are also the three tips I want to encourage other people to try. Firstly is to build a strong foundation of the drawing skills. including drawing, sketching, and painting. It might be a kind of boring journey; however, a strong foundation skill is the cornerstone for developing personal style. With those skills, you can play with color, the shape and other things. Second thing is reading, it is important for artists to gain the inspirations. Secondly is keep experimenting and trying. The more we try, the more we will know what we really interested with and it also helps to form the personal style.

What would you advise – going all in on your strengths or investing on areas where you aren’t as strong to be more well-rounded?

For this question, I will say 70% of improving to be more rounded and 30% to go all in our strengths. For the fundamental stage, it’s better for me to be more well rounded. Being a more well-rounded person can help us gain a higher perspective. Being more comprehensive will also allow us to have more possibilities, and we can try more things. In my case, I initially struggled with digital illustration tools, being more comfortable with traditional media. However, I realize nowadays lots of works objectively requires digital media. Consequently, I learned the skills such as Photoshop, and apply many of my personal interests in traditional media to the digital media. When we have no obvious shortcomings, I think we can develop our personal strengths. This will help us to occupy a place in our own field and become a more distinctive person. At the same time, after being a more well rounded person also helped us to know more about ourselves and develop our personal occupations.

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Image Credits

Qingyang Zhu

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