Jade They
Inspired from a recent family trip in China, where Jade They had her very first family reunion this series presents two pieces colliding English and Chinese printing techniques together. They presents mirrored landscapes with ‘Go Home I’ and ‘Go Home II’, two images of landscapes and flora of both countries intersecting and disrupting each other. The pieces are mirrored, representing two different sides of her, yet they do not touch. With these abstract works, Jade They shares with us her own experience of being mixed race: a feeling, she finds, of not having a home or a race as one can occasionally feel as if neither will accept you as part of their community, and sometimes one can feel to have the best bits of both with a richer, more multi layered heritage of the two together.
Her smaller piece, ‘Fragments’ represents flower motif that could be an English rose or a Chinese peony, the drawing is fragmented and distorted so that the viewer cannot tell one from the other.
Fragments, 2 layered Screen Print on Somerset paper, 300 gsm, 21 x 30 cm, (SOLD)
Go Home I, Screen Print on Guangzhou Chinese paper, 50 x 100 cm, 2023
Go Home II, Screen Print on Guangzhou Chinese paper, 50 x 100 cm, 2023
Jade They (b.1990, UK) is a printmaker and illustrator based in London. Her prints are centred on literature, landscapes and her Chinese and English background.
Jade They is an artist exploring the themes of identity, often searching for a place of home in the environments she draws. She utilises the print techniques of two cultures and in this manner, inter-weaves her English and Chinese heritage by combining their traditional printing styles in her own way.
Jade They most recent solo show was with Gallery White Box in 2022. She has had several exhibitions across London such as Bermondsey Project Space in 2021, Lewisham Art House in 2020, East End Print and Deptford Does Art in 2019. She participated in print fairs such as the London Illustration Fair and the Woolwich Contemporary Print Fair. She makes many commissions and has among her clients Luchterhand, The Quarto Group and Studio Pensom and has worked with magazine and books production such as the Wildlife Trust, among others. They has had an interview with Artist and Illustrators Magazine in 2021 on her practice.