Huang Huanyi, a native of Linchuan, Jiangxi Province, graduated from the Department of Art and Design at Jingdezhen Ceramic Institute (now Jingdezhen Ceramic University) with a bachelor’s degree in 1985. In 2006, he earned a master’s degree in ceramics from Wonkwang University in South Korea. He is currently a professor and doctoral supervisor in the Department of Ceramics at the School of Ceramic Art and the director of the Institute of Modern Ceramic Art at Jingdezhen Ceramic University. He has previously served as the deputy head of the Department of Ceramic Art at Jingdezhen Ceramic Institute.

Huang Huanyi is an expert enjoying the special government allowance from the State Council, is a member of the China Artists Association, and is a jury member for selecting Chinese Arts and Crafts Masters. His ceramic works have been collected by museums and galleries both domestically and internationally, and he has published several books, including The Aesthetic Characteristics of Environmental Ceramics and Famous 20th-Century Artists: Huang Huanyi. He has also published numerous articles in leading academic journals such as Literature and Art Studies, Journal of Nanjing Arts Institute (Fine Arts & Design), Wen Yi Zheng Ming, China Ceramics, and Journal of Ceramics. His ceramic works have won awards at multiple domestic and international professional and comprehensive competitions, and he is the first artist from China shortlisted for the International Ceramics Festival Mino. His work Abnormal State was nominated for an award at the 14th National Exhibition of Fine Arts, Ceramics Exhibition.

Beyond is a representative work from Huang Huanyi’s early modern ceramic period. The relationship between tradition and modernity, and between the old and the new, has always been a central theme in his thinking. How to merge ancient traditions with modern aesthetics to breathe new life into them has driven many of his pioneering attempts. With a postmodern perspective, he examines classical ceramics, striving to modernize them while preserving the continuity of traditional forms. In his work Beyond, he uses the technique of defamiliarization to deconstruct traditional blue-and-white porcelain vases. This deconstruction undermines the elegant, serene, and harmonious aesthetic typically associated with conventional ceramics, replacing it with an unfamiliar and modern sensibility. The graceful porcelain vase, seemingly casually twisted, gains a new vitality. The half-closed red bottleneck not only breaks the functional limitations of the object but also changes the spatial form of traditional vessels. The base, coated with a black-yellow bubble glaze, lends the vase a monumental presence, simultaneously showing respect for cultural traditions. The black-yellow texture of the clay glaze further contrasts with the delicate, translucent blue-and-white porcelain. In this artwork, the harmonious interplay between tradition and modernity, as well as the balance between inheritance and innovation, is masterfully embodied.