Yi Zhao

Yi Zhao is a Chinese contemporary jewellery artist who focuses on the subtle aspects of everyday life and the relationships between objects. She collects inconspicuous objects and regards them as media that carry personal memory and reflection. She uses jewellery as a medium to present the subtle narratives between humans and objects, reminding us of the meanings that are concealed and overlooked within the fast-paced rhythm of modern life.

Currently a professor at Beijing Institute of Fashion Technology, Zhao has previously conducted long-term fieldwork in regions including Guizhou, Tibet, Yunnan, and Shanxi, carrying out systematic research into ethnic and folk metal crafts. This in-depth research experience in materials and techniques laid a solid foundation for her subsequent artistic practice. The visiting study experience at the Royal Academy of Fine Arts in Belgium (2010) further deepened her understanding of the context of contemporary jewellery. These diverse experiences have enabled her practice to maintain a state of balance between traditional craft, contemporary concepts, and personal experience.

Zhao’s practice arises from her careful observation of daily experience. By collecting objects from everyday life that stimulate reflection, she recombines these objects to form jewellery that shows her personal reflections. Over the years, she has explored her own path in combining traditional materials with modern contexts. Through Chinese traditional crafts such as lacquer art, she has established a cultural dialogue that spans time. She regards lacquer as a medium that carries time: through repeated lacquering, waiting for it to dry, and accepting uncertainty, the making process itself becomes an important component of the work. She intentionally chooses imperfection and repair as creative strategies, allowing cracks, mending, and traces of time to be retained within the works, embodying a value system that celebrates slowness.

Yi Zhao’s works attempt to move beyond jewellery’s surface function as bodily adornment, instead treating it as a carrier of time, memory, and personal reflection. She accumulates strength through restraint and slowness, thereby resisting the speed, efficiency, and perfectionism of contemporary society. Her practice invites viewers to re-examine small, easily overlooked things, extending personal experience into a more universal mode of reflection, and allowing these details to become presences that can be perceived and valued.