Chinese Graffiti & Chinese street artist
During my time in I have seen many street in of graffiti but mainly in specific areas connected to contemporary art such as 798 in Beijing or other art districts around China. Unfortunately, I do not know many Chinese street artist and it seems that graffiti is not regarded primarily as vandalism by writers, officials or in public opinion, at least as long as it appears in certain areas and without clear political content.
However, I found it quite hard to asses more details about Chinese street artist, their art and where to find them. Therefore I started this list with names of current Chinese street artist who have been named online and some of their works can be seen in China or around the world. It would be cool if anybody of them reading this could give me more background info and I can update this list with more names or details. Love this stuff!
1 SINIC
SINIC is a Hong Kong based graffiti/street artist representing IDT & KB graffiti/street art crew. Since 2003, he has been actively involved in this kind of art form. Throughout his art journey, Sinic is constantly trying to break boundaries of graffiti. Currently, he is trying to combine graffiti with Western and Chinese calligraphy as a new type of “fusion” art form.
Other than working full-time as an artist, as well as co-founder of the biggest graffiti battle – Wall Lords, INVASIAN graffiti magazine and 1AGN sub culture guide book, SINIC is also an organizer/promoter for asian urban street culture projects. In the recent years, his work was widely praised by galleries and global artist networks, thus giving him more opportunities to showcase his work in different countries.
2 KWANYIN CLAN
KWAN-YIN CLAN was founded in June 2006, the crew is committed to the dissemination and development of graffiti art in China. The name “Kwanyin” comes from the story of “Guanyin Buddha” when Buddhism was introduced to China during the Tang Dynasty. Among the many Buddha, the Bodhisattva Guanyin changed from male to female, with the social environment changes Therefore the crew name implies that graffiti art as a foreign culture, first of all must be integrated into China’s culture and China’s social environment.
3 WHYYY (instagram)
Since he began using spray paint in 2001, Whyyy has discovered a combination of graffiti art and Chinese cultural traditional arts to produce innovative chemistry – the “auspicious cloud” from ancient China. Inspired by graffiti ideas and techniques, he creates new styles of calligraphy and forms a unique style of his own.
The distorted graphics and letters are full of a sense of rhythm and stretching force. The works, therefore, are substantial as well as virtual, planar yet tridimensional. Everything is unpredictable and changing – just like the clouds – and hence produces different thoughts from the drawings.
Through continuous thinking and experience, Whyyy aims at integrating art forms into people’s life and surroundings, as well as pouring into them the contemporary spirit and his unique artistic air.
4 TAMSL
With a love and passion for graffiti, TAMSL uses his spare time for creation and has turned it into a lifestyle of his own. In creating art pieces he endeavors to combine logical mindset with creative ideas, reaching a balance between sense and sensibility.
5 Bao
Bao is a Hong Kong born and based self-taught artist who mainly loves freestyle work with mural, street art and illustrations. She started her career in 2015 and shortly afterwards collaborated with various international brands.
6 DALeast
Chinese-born DALeast is easily one of the most prolific street artists of our time, as well as an accomplished painter, sculptor, and digital artist.The dark imagery found in DALeast’s art is undeniably captivating, woven with intricate detail while focusing on the simple subjects in his pieces.
A majority of DALeast’s art utilizes animals as the subject matter. In many of his works, less pronounced line work in the background serves as a shadowing effect for the images illustrated in the forefront.
When viewing DALeast’s art, there is seemingly magic in his ability to establish illusion with a certain combination of lines. DALeast delivers a sense of wonder with his work every time. One aspect of this style, which makes DALeast‘s art truly amazing, is how skillfully he manipulates his splintered lines in order to capture the movement, form, stillness or feeling of the respective subject. DALeast’s art is meant to capture its audience’s emotion in every way possible.
7 XEME
Xeme is a Hong Kong based graffiti artist who is primarily dedicated to Chinese letters and patterns. Even though he started “writing” in late 2001, Xeme is considered as a pioneer and one of the first in Asia to start the true art of piecing in Chinese written language. Motivated by a documentary he saw on writers who were explaining how it’s too hard to write and develop in Chinese – Xeme started writing different Chinese words every time he worked on a piece.
Xeme has been painting in Chinese characters and sometimes with Chinese calligraphy on his canvas works just to represent his background, and he is also known for the historic graffiti pieces that he has done utilizing the native Chinese characters.
8 ROBBBB
ROBBBB was born in Beijing in 1990. He graduated with a bachelor’s degree from the Department of Stage Design, The Central Academy of Drama. Now he is living and working in Beijing.
ROBBBB is an iconic figure in China’s contemporary street art field. His artworks are created based on inspirations from his living environment and his reflections on the relationship between today’s era and people, society and people, as well as city and people. With penetrating insight into the constantly changing reality, he has created many artworks featuring a sense of black humor, which focus on exploring the contradiction and absurdity of existence as well as the anxiety, distress and weakness deep in our minds under a certain disordered state.
9 QI XINGHUA (Facebook)
Chinese 3D artist Qi Xinghua uses his skills to turn bleak walls in Chinese cities into stunning works of art – he brings concrete to life. But his street art often does not last, as Qi faces different forces that work against him and his work. The artist was born in Heilongjiang in 1982. He was inspired by western 3D sidewalk chalk artists, and soon developed an interest to do the same. He enrolled in the Central Academy of Fine Arts, and started focusing on multi-dimensional art in 2002.
10 Hua Tunan (Instagram)
Chen Yingjie, aka Hua Tunan, is a young Chinese street artist. He was born in 1991 in Foshan, Guangdong, China. In 2010, he studied in Raffles Design Institute in Singapore. Now, Chen Yingjie works and lives in Shunde (Guangdong, China).
In addition to Chinese ink painting, the artist also devotes himself to canvas oil painting and mural painting. His art is a combina- tion of traditional Chinese ink painting art with Western graffiti art. Different media, materials and places, all these elements of painting lead Chen Yingjie to dig into the relationship between Oriental traditional ink painting and Western street art. As a result, he creates a unique Chinese graffiti style. Recently, he was named one of ‘25 Contemporary Chinese Artists You Need to Know’ by the American Complex magazine.
11 Sheep Chen
Sheep (Chen Yang), is an artist from Jiazing, China, began graffiti in 2008. In 2016, spiritual meditation practice began to change their world outlook, believing that the strength of “mindfulness” and the importance of living in the present, and the way and subject of painting changed accordingly.
The style of Sheep’s works has been influenced with the magnetic field of the surrounding environment with a bright colour and hint of words. His works have a harmonious power and the whole work develops positive feelings.