Meet Kuei-Pi LI | Artist

We had the good fortune of connecting with Kuei-Pi LI and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Kuei-Pi, why did you pursue a creative career?
It is my first time to reply this question- as an artist, most people are already imagined your life, like you must have a traumatic childhood, taciturn with weird hobbies and incredible ideas shown in dedication to creativity, because of the poor financial management skills, you are always face on problems. They are more focus on another part of you, after you creative a representative work which be collected in the museum or someone’s home. How did you creative an incredible price for auction or art market? How did you worked those art project, exhibition and works with require high capital investment and so on. People would rather believe that you have extraordinary luck and get help from heavy hitter.

These questions can only give us a fast way to understand how an art industry worked like how a chair be produced from a factory, but hard to know how it start and why creativity work in this world.

I was stay in art talented curriculum of 12 year basic education for 10 years in Taiwan, after it I studied in different University of arts for my BA and MFA degree. It looks very normal, but actually more than 80﹪students give up in process. It might showed the dark side of the art education and the key issue of it –can creativity be cultivated through mechanisms and become a tool for people to improve their quality of life?

In the beginning, art talented curriculum is seen as a shortcut to entering a good quality education environment in public schools for ordinary families who cannot afford the high tuition fees of private schools. After they can choice the subject they really like and which can support their life, creative is not important like before. Other problems like students have talents but are not suitable for the art education system, art mechanism due to personality reasons or can’t find the balance of financial support and artwork.

When creativity is regarded as a product to improve the quality of life, a series of problem is coming. I guess we just have to accept that creativity cannot be quantified or mass produced- it means, it might can join any kind of education system, but hard to study as an independent subject. Because the root that supports is a person’s inner passion, it is hard to find a reason, because love and enjoy are the nature, not a choice.

Through some serious methods, we can find ways to prolong love and enjoyment, control passion and transform it into a comprehensible form, like a painting or a video. Some artists develop amazing abilities and contribute their creativity to improve the lives of others. Also because art is difficult to quantify or copy, the crisis of utilitarianism that can be avoided becomes an opportunity to repair the scars of the ethnic conflict, provide insights and so on. That is why I pursue an artistic.

Can you open up a bit about your work and career? We’re big fans and we’d love for our community to learn more about your work.
Starting in 2016, I traveled in Southeast Asia and South Asia, during which I also came into contact with the refugee community. This made me deeply realize that I have many things, and the power of art to cross boundaries of race/gender/faith and open new conversations. These journeys have become important sources for my work. All of my works revolve around the impact of colonialism, criticism of capitalism and questioning of globalization. Presented through video, sounds, installations, and publications.

Any places to eat or things to do that you can share with our readers? If they have a friend visiting town, what are some spots they could take them to?
(I am not sure is it means LA or more bigger than it, if it is not I can reply this question again) Over the past few years I have been interested in archives and how images in archives are created and interpreted.

I visited some archives in Cambodia and France. I must say that the small worlds created by the archives gave me a new perspective and rethought the meaning of history as a concept.

If you have enough time, you can’t miss Los Angeles, California Newspaper Archives, The Huntington Library and Southern California Library.

Shoutout is all about shouting out others who you feel deserve additional recognition and exposure. Who would you like to shoutout?
I am very grateful to my grandmother, who was a great female creativor born in the Japanese colonial era. She ran a personal clothing studio. This studio was once used as a clothing classroom, and she trained some pattern makers, seamstress and clothing designer. All of this stopped before I was born due to her health, and the clothing studio was transformed into a shop selling women’s clothing.

The hard life in the colonial era did not affect her enthusiasm for learning. When she was young, in order to study fashion design, she rode a bicycle between the clothing designer school in the city center and her home in the country side. When she was too tired, she turned the chairs into a bed and slept in the classroom and back home in the early morning. She had no chance to obtain a primary school diploma, her Japanese learned in daily life. She enjoys creating and learning new things very much. I still remember she learned Chinese writing with me when I was a child.
When I was in university, she learned to applied for a Facebook account and browse online clothing stores.

She always reminds me to keep an open mind, open up new doors, and stay positive. “Nothing is important than your happy from learning and trying some new things” that is what she said.

Website: https://www.likueipi.com/

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/namtru3.8/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/likueipi/?locale=zh_TW

Image Credits
1-1 The workshop of hand crank generator with the director of Niv Art Center and students from Niv School. This school aims to provide free education to children from farm families in rural areas. The director Mathew also running art space for international residence program. Through art project from different artists broaden children’s horizons. ,Kha Kha Sharing Project, Indian, 2019 1-2 Shooting in the workshop, Kha Kha Sharing Project, Indian, 2019 2 Screenshot, Diamond Dream, Video was shot in Cambodia, 2020 3-1 Video installation of TransBorder Project, Kaohsiung museum of fine arts, Taiwan, 2021 (Photo courtesy of Kaohsiung Museum of Fine Arts ) 3-2 Video installation of TransBorder Project, Kaohsiung museum of fine arts, Taiwan, 2021 (Photo courtesy of Kaohsiung Museum of Fine Arts ) 4 Screenshot, Clement Town, 2023 5-1 The performance in exhibition Banana Coin, 2023 (Photo by Sean Wang, courtesy of Hong Foundation) 5-2 Video installation, Banana Coin, Project seek, Taiwan, 2023 (Photo by Sean Wang, courtesy of Hong Foundation) 5-3 Screenshot, Isoamyl Acetate, 2023 (Photo by Sean Wang, courtesy of Hong Foundation)