b. 1998
Lives and works in London.
Luna Sue Huang is a Chinese artist based in London whose practice moves between figuration and text-based abstraction. Beyond painting, she identifies as a storyteller, treating the canvas as a site of psychological repair. Her work navigates the tension between memory and erasure, exploring the complexities of female identity, kinship, and the diasporic experience.
Huang’s trajectory fuses distinct Eastern and Western artistic pedagogies. She graduated from the Hubei Institute of Fine Arts (China) in 2019 with a degree in Oil Painting, establishing a rigorous technical foundation. She subsequently earned an MA in Illustration and Visual Media from the University of the Arts London (UAL) in 2021. This cross-disciplinary background has expanded her practice beyond the canvas; zines, experimental video, installation, and writing are now integral components of her broader narrative projects.
Her paintings often begin with private acts of writing. She inscribes handwritten diaries onto the surface before submerging them beneath layers of oil, rice paper, and medical gauze. Through a cyclical process of sanding, erasing, and re-writing, she builds ‘palimpsest’ surfaces that mimic geological strata. Within these stage-like spaces, defined by an Eastern sense of stillness, she deliberately employs a visual language that is childlike and playful. This aesthetic choice acts as a counterweight, allowing her to handle profound and heavy social issues with a sense of lightness.
As an observer driven by empathy, Huang views her art as a process of healing for both herself and the viewer. Her work has been exhibited internationally, with recent highlights including The Way of All Flesh at Saatchi Gallery (curated by Delphian Gallery, 2024) and the Royal Academy of Arts Summer Exhibition (2023), where her work I will see you again when the darkness ends was displayed.
EXHIBITIONS
2024 The Way of All Flesh, Saatchi Gallery & Delphian Gallery, London
"Papier Vol.2" Group Show, Delphian Gallery, Paja&Bureau, Helsinki
"Inside the Cradle,Outside the Cradle" Group exhibition, Shangzun Gallery, Beijing
"Au Loin Je Vois La Lune", Looloolook Gallery, Paris
Group exhibition, Shapes & Things, London
Young Collectors' Online Exhibition, Young Collectors UK
"I Do This, I Do That", Bay Art Centre, Cardiff
2023 RA Summer Exhibition, Royal Academy of Arts, London
Delphian Open Call Winners Exhibition, Unit 1 Gallery Workshop, London
"Papier" Group Show, Delphian Gallery x La Madeleine, France
"Wild Is The Wind" Group Show, Hew Hood Gallery, London
"Secreats" Group Exhibition, Pilgrims Contemporary Gallery, Keswick
"Roots of Day - Dying on the vine" Group Exhibition, JC Gallery, London
"Floating" A Figurative Exhibition, Pilgrims Contemporary Gallery, Keswick
The First Hubei Youth Fine Arts works Exhibition, Hubei Institute Of Fine Arts Museum
Open Call Exhibition x Invited Artists, Tart Gallery, London
London Paint Club ‘Threads of Perception’ Online Exhibition
Outlook : Contemporary Chinese Art Exhibition
2022 THE INCORRIGIBLE DRAWING CLÜB Online Group Show
Woolwich Contemporary Print Fair, London
Crystal Clear Group Show, 仲町の家, Tokyo
Color 2022, CICA Museum, Korea
2021 Luna Sue X Yang Double Solo Exhibition, Hui Space, Beijing
‘Elephant Without Castle' Exhibition, TED Hangzhou, Hangzhou
'With.In - Belonging is Here' art exhibition, SPARC Space, Venice, Italy
2020 ‘Urban Renewal’ Exhibition, White Culture
Multiplicity Exhibition, Corsica Studio, London
Childish Everywhere, Shenzhen
‘YiXiangYiXiang’ Online Group Exhibition
2019 The 2nd Graduates Art Fair Shenzhen, China
The 3rd 'Golden Time' Graduated Works Exhibition, Star Space, Wuhan
AWARDS AND GRANTS
2023 Delphain Gallery open call 2023 winner
2022 WSXA Paris International Awards, Best Experimental Film, Award Winner
Europe Independent Movie Festival, Best Animation Short Film, Award Winner
Madonie Film Festival, Region of Sicily, Best Animation, Award Winner
Eastern Europe Film Festival, Best Animation, Honorable Mention
Mannheim Arts and Film Festival, Best Animation, Honorable Mention
CURATED SHOWS
2023 'Sun and Moon' The Exhibition of Dialogue Between Emerging Artists From the East and West, The Goose Corporation Art Gallery, Wuhan
2021 Between Shan Shui Group Show, 1974 Club, London
Beyond Nature Group Show, Wendle Court, London
2020 MultipliCity Group Show, Corsica Studio, London
PRESS
2023 'London Paint Club' Magazine Issue No.3
2022 Emerging Artist Luna Sue Huang: Depicting a Healing Poem from a Female Perspective with Brushes, China Civilized Network, 25/04/2023
Luna Sue Huang: Painting Is A Pure Land I Am Glad I Have It, Art China, 24/11/2022
Creating 'Poetic' Paintings That Tell Their Own Stories, Yachang Art News, 08/10/2022
EDUCATION
2019-2021 London College of Communication, MA Illustration and Visual Media
2015-2019 Hubei Insitute of Fine Arts, BA Painting
ARTIST STATEMENT
I am a storyteller and an observer. My practice moves between figuration and text-based abstraction, treating the canvas as a living archive of memory and repair. My emotional source is empathy; I focus on the tension between recording and forgetting, attempting to negotiate the complex inner lives of women and the fluidity of a diasporic identity through painting.
I write to remember, but I paint to forget or transform. Private writing is often the first step in my process. I write handwritten diaries directly onto the substrate, then I let the words sink beneath layers of gauze, rice paper, and oil paint. I create a "palimpsest" surface by repeatedly sanding, erasing, and rewriting. While the remaining readable words create new narratives and transform into a new kind of poetry, the original text becomes a ghostly presence that is felt but difficult to read.
I am not limited to a single form; zines, experimental video, installation, and even writing itself are all parts of my broader narrative project. In my paintings, I combine these abstract textures with figurative characters or small objects. These act as anchors, fixing the work in physical reality. In my visual forms, I like to keep a sense of playfulness and childlike wonder, using this lightness to convey important - and occasionally weighty - topics. Similar to how we continuously rewrite our own histories in order to survive, this process of erasure and reconstruction is protective and restorative rather than destructive.
This methodology allows me to build stage-like spaces that hold an Eastern sense of stillness, rooted in Vipassana meditation and the aesthetics of Dunhuang murals. In this space, I do not attempt to provide answers. Instead, I view painting as a site for questioning. My art is a process of self-healing that seeks to extend that healing to others, inviting the viewer to pause and reflect within the after-images of a narrative that has been written, erased, and ultimately repaired.
