BIO
Ray (Tsung-Jui) Tsou is a Taiwanese visual and performance artist. She holds a B.F.A in Acting from Taipei National University of the Arts. She experiments with various mediums, such as painting, textile art, photography, dance, and the performing arts. Her work examines and investigates the synthetization and transformation between language, visual communication, and physical movement.
鄒宗芮，台灣視覺及表演藝術家。畢業於國立臺北藝術大學戲劇學系，主修表演。實驗多樣媒材創作，包括繪畫，織品，攝影，舞蹈，及行為表演。作品解釋及探討語言、圖像、及身體動能之間的轉譯，共存與衝突的關係。
2016至2019年在台灣以自由表演者的身份工作及創作。合作對象包含：盜火劇團、安娜琪舞蹈劇場、不可無料劇場、良日激動所、葛多藝術會。國際交流經驗包含參與巴黎舞蹈藝術中心CN D主辦 Camping工作坊，及哥本哈根主辦世界舞蹈論壇daCi。
於2019年移居紐約後，鄒宗芮於紐約藝術學生聯盟進修並成為聯盟成員。展覽經驗包括2020年Life Under the Pandemic Moon、2021年紐約藝術學生聯盟與ChaShaMa藝廊合作的Exhibition Outreach: Primavera，並於2022年以台灣新生代藝術家身份，受邀參展駐紐約辦事處與皇后區植物園合辦的台灣蘭花節展覽。2023年一月，鄒宗芮於台南不存在劇場及圍讀咖啡舉辦雙個展《刺字計劃》及《散步的人》，展覽於紐約完成的兩個系列作品。
1994年生於台灣台北，鄒宗芮現旅居美國紐約。
Experience Highlights
After Ray Tsou graduated from high school as a fine art experimental course student in 2013, she started her exploration in performance art while she followed the visual art path. She entered Taipei National University of the Arts to study Acting. In 2015, she finished a term of acting courses for an exchange program at Art University Bournemouth, United Kingdom. After this experience, she returned to Taiwan to finish her acting studies and started to perform as a freelance actress until 2019. She had worked with companies including Voleur du Feu Theatre, Anarchy dance theatre, BIU theatre, Thatalright Art Space, and Godot ArtAssociation. Besides her acting career, she has also participated in international workshops such as Centre National de la Danse CN D Camping in Paris, and The daCi World Congress in Copenhagen to continue her professional practice in dancing and conceptual art.
After moving to New York at the end of 2019, Ray studied at The Art Student League of New York and became a league member. Her work had been selected to be in the league’s juried online exhibition Life Under the Pandemic Moon, and Exhibition Outreach: Primavera in ChaShaMa Space. In June 2021, she collaborated with the artist agency ArtsBerry and was featured in their event The Asian Voice. The Artist Interview, which was an element of the event, was published on Cision PR Newswire and ArtsBerry’s website. In 2022, she was invited to attend and exhibit her artwork at Taiwan: A World of Orchids exhibition curated by Queens Botanical Garden and the Taipei Economic and Cultural Office in New York. The event was published on World Journal Daily Newspaper . Ray's two solo exhibitions Embroidered Emotions Project and A Strolling Person was showcased in Absence Theater and Atmosphere Cafe in Tainan, Taiwan in 2023.
Born in 1994 in Taiwan, Ray Tsou currently lives and works in New York.
Artist Statement
Through my continuous exploration of many different mediums and techniques of art, I would like to objectify and visualize the movement of feelings and emotions. My background in acting formulizes the way I approach the psychological world. I aim to explore human minds by revealing myself and my subconscious. My work contains private, unfiltered materials from my past and present, such as notes from the everyday, dreams, and emotion memories. By taking myself as a reference in my work, I attempt to open dialogues about mental movement, self-awareness, and the natural-truth in humanity.
By revealing my reality through art, I explore the empathy and collective subconscious in and between each human being, as I am one human co-existing with the viewers.
I regard my art as a process of weaving subconsciousness into a visual language to communicate and meditate with my inner-self and the rest that exists.
CV
SOLO EXHIBITIONS
December-January 2022-2023 Embroidered Emotions, Absence Theater, Taipei, Taiwan
December-January 2022-2023 A Strolling Person, Atmosphere, Taipei, Taiwan
GROUP EXHIBITIONS
August 2022 Taiwan: A World of Orchids exhibition, Queens Botanical Garden and the Taipei Economic and Cultural Office in New York, New York, USA
March 2022 The Art Student League Student Salon, The Art Student League of New York, New York, USA
April-June 2021 Exhibition Outreach: Primavera, ChaShaMa X The Art Students League of New York, New York, USA
March-May 2020 Life Under the Pandemic Moon, The Art Students League of New York, New York, USA
PUBLICATIONS
“World Journal Daily Newspaper on Taiwan: A World of Orchids exhibition”, World Journal, 2022-08-12
“The Asian Voice Artist talk”, Artsberry, 2021-06-19
“Asian Voice Brunch Talk- Interview-style Talk Featured the Perspectives of Three New York-based Asian Artists”, Cision PR Newswire, 2021-07-15
“Primavera: The Art Student League”, ChaShaMa, 2021-03-30
MEMBER OF THE FOLLOWING ORGANIZATION
The Art Student League of New York, Joined 2020
TALKS AND WORKSHOPS
November 2018 Taipei Performing Art Center, Art View-The International Trend of Performing Arts, Guest speaker, Taipei, Taiwan
● Introduced the Camping workshop and shared the experience as a participant.
August 2018 Yang Xi Art Gallery, Art and Globalization- Experience in CN D Camping 2018 and Festival d'Avignon,Speaker, Taipei, Taiwan
● Shared the experience of traveling in France and working with international artists.
● Gave introduction and experience sharing for Festival d’Avignon.
August 2018 Cloud gate dance company, Body Festival- Cross generation talk between artists, Guest speaker, Taipei, Taiwan
● Participated the talk as one of the three invited young rising artists. The three artists had a conversation with successful choreographer Cheng Tsung Lung and musician Kung Yu-Chi about thoughts on art and how generation effect on art view.
June 2018 Centre National de la Danse CN D Camping, Participant/Dancer, Paris, France
March 2016 Taipei National University of the Arts, Shakespeare Acting method workshop, Tutor, Taipei, Taiwan