Painting the town red

Volume 10 Number 5 May 12 - June 8 2014

 

From basketballs to chopsticks, the whole world is ‘Red’ Hong Yi’s canvas, writes David Scott

We’re often told as children that we shouldn’t play with our food. But take a quick look through Hong Yi’s online portfolio and you get the impression she never listened to her parents.

Alongside portraits of Myanmar politician Aung San Suu Kyi (made out of dried carnations) and singer Adele (made out of melted candles) is her ’31 Days of Food Creativity’, a collection of colourful images on white plates, made of everything from rice to radishes. 

It’s a collection that caught the world’s attention and compelled many to ask: who is this artist, better known as ‘Red’, who uses everyday objects to make her designs?

“I’ve always loved art and design, but I never thought I’d really be able to turn it into a career,” says Red, the Malaysian-born, Shanghai resident whose works have been seen in media from Esquire to CNN. “Of all the career options in design, the safest and most stable one seemed to be architecture, so I chose that path.”

It was a path that took her through the Faculty of Architecture at Melbourne and onto China as part of the Australian firm HASSELL, where her first forays into art – besides some doodling of Big Bird and Snuffy in her early kindergarten books – came during her spare time over the weekend.

“Architecture school in Melbourne taught me that there are many directions, possibilities and techniques out there. And given the nature of the course, it also taught me how to manage my time well!”

While still with HASSELL, Red took a six month sabbatical to get her art and design career started, leading to the setup of her own studio in January last year. “I started out being my own videographer, manager, financial planner … it was hectic and there was so much to learn! But this year I started building up my team, and I now have a small group of people working for me in Shanghai.” 

HASSELL has continued to be involved and supportive of her work, even funding some of her projects.

The first project she uploaded to YouTube in 2012 – a portrait of Chinese basketball icon Yao Ming, made using a painted basketball – has turned out to be the catalyst for a whole range of interesting artistic collaborations. Most recently that’s included crafting a three-dimensional portrait of kung-fu movie legend Jackie Chan – all out of chopsticks – for his 60th birthday, as well as being commissioned by Hewlett-Packard to do a TV commercial featuring her work. 

She was also invited to speak at the EG Conference in California these past two years, an invite that Red reflected was an honour, given she had the chance to speak to a crowd of established, successful artists such as The Simpsons producer Matt Groening, author Amy Tan, multi-Grammy award winner Linda Rondstadt and Mythbusters co-host Adam Savage.

“I’m just extremely grateful that I’m able to share my work with so many people. Sometimes I wonder if all this is really happening to me still.

“It has always been a dream to be able to make a living creating art. It’s been surreal having people from all over the world – and people like Jackie Chan! – tell me they like my work.

“I feel lucky and I feel blessed.”

For more photos and info about Red go here.

Watch a video about Red’s chopstick portrait of movie icon Jackie Chan: