Lingyi Zhu

Lingyi Zhu is a Shanghai-based graphic designer interested in communicating with words and images.

Lingyi studied Chinese language and literature for BA at East China Normal University(ECNU) and applied for a MA in Visual Communication at the Royal College of Art. After graduating from BA at 22, she got the opportunity to be a graphic designer for Radisson Hotel in Shanghai for one year. 

She is interested in the relationship between humans and their surroundings and is exploring video work.

Living in the city, we are citizens with many restrictions. 

As we walk, we follow directions or signs. When we are in attractions, we are mostly just passers-by or tourists... Citizens obey all the rules of the city, while the running of it seems to have nothing to do with their presence.

Are we blending into our environment, or is our environment determining our identity? Are there other ways to interact outside of these basic rules? 

When I first came to London, I had a car accident, and I found that I was not sensitive to the traffic regulations here. Since then, I’ve been paying attention to it.

Every day I walk nearby the Westway carriageway, finding that the personal marks left by people in these constructions are so different from those standardized traffic signs Westway provided.