Leah Tianyue Zhong
Leah Tianyue Zhong
Born in Chengdu, Zhong now lives and works in Los Angeles. Since receiving her MA in Painting from London’s Royal College of Art in 2020, Zhong has been the subject of several solo exhibitions including Loyal Gallery, Stockholm (2024) and Mou Projects, Hong Kong (2023), with an upcoming show at LBF Contemporary, London (2025).
Fear guides Leah Tianyue Zhong’s paintbrush. It’s the powerhouse that encourages her to paint the same subject again and again. It’s the gut feeling that shuns the temptation to make corrections in her work. It’s this sense of fear that forces Zhong’s paintings into expressing the unknown; a second body to portray the feelings that she couldn’t speak out loud.
Photographs get the creative ball rolling, her paintings drawing inspiration from the roll of film in her own Pentax alongside seldom-seen historical photographs from 20th-century modern China. Intrigued by the process of transforming one art form into another, Zhong aims to seek out unforeseen elements during the painting process—a figure, a historical event, or a lived experience of her own.
The result is a canvas adrift with fleeting shadows, flowing lines, and sudden stark movement. Figures, shapes and scenes appear somewhat incomplete, reflective of an unfiltered stream of consciousness that made their way through the paintbrush onto the stretch of canvas beneath.
Fear guides Leah Tianyue Zhong’s paintbrush. It’s the powerhouse that encourages her to paint the same subject again and again. It’s the gut feeling that shuns the temptation to make corrections in her work. It’s this sense of fear that forces Zhong’s paintings into expressing the unknown; a second body to portray the feelings that she couldn’t speak out loud.
Photographs get the creative ball rolling, her paintings drawing inspiration from the roll of film in her own Pentax alongside seldom-seen historical photographs from 20th-century modern China. Intrigued by the process of transforming one art form into another, Zhong aims to seek out unforeseen elements during the painting process—a figure, a historical event, or a lived experience of her own.
The result is a canvas adrift with fleeting shadows, flowing lines, and sudden stark movement. Figures, shapes and scenes appear somewhat incomplete, reflective of an unfiltered stream of consciousness that made their way through the paintbrush onto the stretch of canvas beneath.
Featured Work
Making Braids
2023
Making Braids
Leah Tianyue Zhong
2023
163 x 127cm
Oil
