李若菡 • Ruohan Li

Bio

Ruohan Li is an artist and a filmmaker born in Anshan, China. She has studied and worked in Beijing and currently works in Los Angeles. Her practice involves experimental film, video art, installation and documentary, but is not limited to film or any single medium. Building on her background in contemporary art, she is well versed in installation art and experimental video art. She also has interdisciplinary collaborations with choreographers, dancers, composers, animators to experiment and find more precise ways to express abstract concepts.

Ruohan uses the perspective of her generation to excavate and explore personal memories and emotions in the context of the vast Chinese cultural background and the conditions of Chinese society. She has an insight into the changes of human society and sensitively captures the details of her daily life. Through the observation, she focuses on the vertical exploration of history and culture. As a Chinese artist living in the United States, she focuses on the comparative study of Eastern and Western cultures, looking for different sources, and presenting the power of cultural collision and the beauty of diversity to the audience. In her previous works, we can see the combination of her personal documentary language with a self-effacing humor and ironic attitude, which is telling the undetected repetition of life. We can also see her attention to the depth of the specific culture and the translation from text into the images by her romantic and poetic tone.