Acrylic on canvas, 16x20in, July 2026

In this piece, which is 薪火相传 in Chinese, I am riding a red dragon, reaching out toward the stars, with Beijing far below me. It is Lunar New Year’s Eve and the full moon shining bright above. I was born in the Chinese year of the dragon and have always loved these mythical creatures. This painting celebrates my Chinese heritage and blends mythical, traditional, and modern elements. I had a lot of fun experimenting with the lighting in this piece, mixing both the warm light from the city and the cool light from the moon.

Acrylic on canvas, 16x20in, June 2026

“Still the Sea” paints a picture of me, wearing a Junior Ranger vest and a shell necklace, watching a tidepool with swirling ripples on the surface and a world of life underneath.  Tidepools are often overlooked parts of the ocean.  The seemingly calm water, as opposed to the constant waves and motion of the ocean, makes it hard to connect tidepools to the sea.  But in fact, they are home to a multitude of varied sea creatures, and if you look closely, tidepools are full of motion! I remember, as a kid, traveling to Acadia National Park and completing the Junior Ranger booklet, which encouraged me to explore and observe the tidepools. Sitting by the tidepools, I was fascinated by the starfish, mussels, and barnacles clinging to rocks, somehow surviving in the harsh intertidal zone, being able to live in both worlds. That experience taught me that the ocean is more than the big creatures like whales and dolphins; it is the little critters, the ones who play just as important a role in the ecosystem but are often underappreciated. The tide pool showed me how the ocean sustains a whole hidden community of life.  This is what inspired me to paint this piece; I chose acrylic because painting is a 

Acrylic on canvas, 12x16in, March 2026

This is an acrylic still life I painted, including some personal objects I brought from home, such as the red knot, my brushes, patches, Science Olympiad medal, and plushie keychain (her name is Ellen Potato). Painting this still life helped me think about how objects interacted with one another in a setting. It also taught me to decompose the scene into its different components, and work on each of them individually while still taking the entire thing into account.

I enjoyed adding the pops of red to the piece - in fact, I bought a new tube of brighter red paint specifically to do that! Red is one of my favorite colors because of its ability to catch your eye and stand out from the rest of the colors.

I took progress photos after every day I worked on this painting, which you can scroll through on the image carousel to the left to see how the painting slowly took shape.

Acrylic on canvas, 16x20in, December 2025

This piece represents my life, including versions of me from the past (in the painting on the wall), present (looking into the piano), and future (reflection in the water). The setting is a familiar place for me: the "piano room", which I visit at least once a day. This room has seen my journey as a pianist from the first notes to Rachmaninoff concertos.

The piano is filled with deep blue water, giving the impression that it is bottomless like a void into another dimension, the future filled with improbabilities that I can't yet see. Behind the piano, the quadrants of the window cycle through the seasons, showing that time passes even as I worry about the future. My sister peeks through the window from outside, always there, adding fun and lightheartedness to my contemplation.

Colored pencil on black paper, 10x15in, 2023

This was one of my first hyperrealism studies.  It took me countless hours and many white colored pencils (I experimented with different brands, but Prismacolor white pencils were still superior to the others) to finish, but I was very proud of the result. This piece was displayed in a nature-themed gallery at my art school.

This was the first of several drawings I made that include insects, including bees (order hymenoptera), moths (order lepidoptera), and dragonflies (order odonata)! I love entomology :)

Colored pencil, 9x12in, February 2025

This was a submission for the Virginia Junior Duck Stamp Contest (which earned an Honorable Mention), featuring a cinnamon teal (anas cyanoptera). I loved the combination of warm reds and cool blues and greens.

The piece depicts a duck watching its companions as they prepare to migrate to the Caribbean for the winter.

Watercolor, 20x24in, 2023

This piece was a watercolor study of a kingfisher as it emerges from the water.  The hardest parts of this piece were the reflection and the water splash, which I did using white gouache. Despite being difficult, I finished this piece rather quickly, completing it in just three hours - I guess this is a testament to how quick watercolor is as a medium, but it's one of the trickiest to master as well, in my opinion.

Despite having been completed almost two years ago, this still remains one of my favorite watercolor pieces!

Acrylic on canvas, 12x16in, 2025

This was a surrealism project. If you look closely, the real horse fades into a wooden horse in the back section, and the size and scale of everything just feels a little bit off. The metal cat (or is it a fox?) was definitely the most fun part of this project, with all the reflections from the chair and the blue fabric.

Graphite pencil, 17x14in, 2025

A real bird and a paper crane, flying away from each other on flight feathers and paper wings. Shaded rectangles and spheres isolate different regions of the piece with different contrast levels. I really enjoyed making this piece, from planning the composition to detailing the feathers on the egret (bird). This is one of my favorite black-and-white drawings!

This piece won a Silver Key in the Scholastics Art and Writing Awards 2025.

Matchsticks, wire, and lots of hot glue, 2025

I made this dragonfly out of cut-up matchsticks and wire, discovering that creating things in 3D is very different from just drawing in 2D. There were challenges with the size and thickness of the body (first it was too long, then it was too short, then too wide), but overall it was a great learning experience.

This piece won a Silver Key in the Scholastics Art and Writing Awards 2025.

Watercolor, June 2025

This is an example of my looser, sketchier work - I did this in about an hour at a local botanical park. I saw a ton of turtles all piled up on a rock, soaking up the sun, as well as some cute statues of fairies on snails.

Acrylic on canvas, 12x16in, January 2023

This was my first time painting a realistic portrait and one of the first time I had ever drawn a realistic portrait. It sure was a new experience mixing different colors like reds, blues, and purples for the shadows, instead of just varyingly darker shades of tan. I liked the contrast between the blue of her water-hair and the warmth of her skin and the seashells in the background.

Acrylic on canvas, 12x16in, December 2022

This was a study to practice painting reflections. It was one of my favorite acrylic paintings a few years ago. I loved painting the colorful boat, although drawing a boat from this perspective was quite difficult. I think this painting shows how much I've improved in acrylic painting over the course of three years, both in the confidence of brushstrokes as well as an understanding of lighting in general.