Born in Beijing and now based in New York, Wenjue Lu studied and obtained her undergraduate degree at Parsons School of Design. Insisting in creating on a hands-on basis, she devoted herself to the possibilities of naturally-colored fibers, on its different shades and textures, while infusing her ongoing exploration of her philosophy of lives born within the process into the creations.
Though majored in fashion design, Wenjue seeks not to participate but to disintegrate fashion. In 2020, Wenjue launched her eponymous studio Wenjüe Lu with partner Chufeng Fang. The studio shall serve as a multidisciplinary platform integrating the multiple forms of different mediums, a visual and aesthetic way to tell a story, to put out a statement, to disclose truths about oneself. Repulsed by the idea of mechanically reproduced commodities, they prefer treating each of their pieces as individual works of art, regardless of form, informed by an ever-lasting slowness.
Creating is “just like writing a poem”, it can be abstract or figurative, truthful or paradoxical, macroscopic or microscopic, modern or ancient, it can fill itself with memories or imaginations, and it can convey emotions on its own terms. You can submerge in it, hide behind it... Each element adopted in a word or sentence can be a thousand rhetorical devices, along with different tonal rhythms, interlaced, woven together, echoing one another within the contexts. In Wenjue’s word: “The poem inside you, that is, your own feelings about the image I provide, they are also you. What you see and think about me, your eyes and my eyes, your thoughts and my thoughts, in the poem everything is one.”
We seek to restore a sense of “slowness” to the ever-accelerating world.
Wenjüe Lu was founded in 2020 seeking to recover what is being overlooked by this fast-paced time. Through combining the authentic traditions across communities, while retaining its unique historical and cultural significance, with the aesthetic of contemporary art driven by emotive expressions to become an artistic entity that defies singular definition— focusing simultaneously and inter-sectionally on studio art, garments, communal happenings, and cultural workshops. We’re driven by a Taoist worldview.
Carried by the likes of Dover Street Market and Net-A-Porter, we also directly offers our creations right here on our site. We aim to emphasize the rediscovery and the re-cherishing of hand-weaving and traditional folk craftsmanship while respecting the natural state of different fibers, from cotton, silk, to linen, hemp… Adopting the fabrics as one of various rhetorical devices within the Wenjüe Lu language.
We believe in the eternal companionship between garment and body. What remains in the end returns to the land; the garment collections are made with the intention for each piece to last, with every use, every wear. Through Wenjüe Lu’s Lifelong Mending Initiative, create ever-lasting memories, with care.
Exhibitions:
Jan 2022 Duo exhibition, Beyorslf Gallery, Los Angeles, CA, United States
Feb-Mar 2022 Selected Poetic Transfigurations, LATITUDE Gallery New York, New York, NY, United States
Aug 2022 - Mar 2023 Fished, The Canvas at the Oculus, New York, NY, US
Nov-Dec 2022 Desert Dhyāna 禪漠, SSSSS, New York, NY, United States
.
Events:
Jul 2022 Of the Virgo - Album Pre-release Art Show, Berry Street Community Garden, Brooklyn, NY, United States
Aug 2022 Bonfire 2022 - Peace & Bonfire, Forest Park Bandshell, Queens, NY, United States
Dec 2022 Broome Room, Sohotel Art Space, New York, NY, United States