From bronze to blown glass, stainless steel to gems, the otherworldly sculptural works of Tian He have deep roots in the earth. The artist, based in Beijing, uses childlike imagery with intricate details that tell contained narratives of strange children and fanciful figures. Her pieces were recently featured in the show “Small is Beautiful VII” at Leo Gallery in Shanghai.
The artist says this, on her use of bubbles as a motif: “The bubbles, made of glass, represent people’s longing for the future, or their expectations of themselves,” she told Women of China. “The bubbles also represent things, like dreams, that are beautiful, but fragile. In Sister, one item — the girl who is blowing bubbles — in the series stands for the real self in everyone’s heart. When you see the front of the bubble, I hope you will feel that although we have to face the harsh realities of life, dreams will always give us power to move forward. Glass is used because it is transparent, and it means the future is unknown to everyone, and that embodies endless hope.”
The artist, born in Guizhou, China, attended Tianjin Academy of Fine Arts in Tianjin, China, before settling in Beijing.
The childhood toys of surrealist painter