Shangkai Kevin Yu, based in New York with an MFA from the New York Academy of the Arts, takes on a lively colorful view of the mundane through everyday objects and imagined scenes. He aims to share the idea of discovering new perspectives, urging the viewer to become more aware and open to the overall human experience. His paintings offer reality with a touch of irony. He builds his scenes, contemplating them in a 3D space, before putting them on canvas where he envelops them in a narrative of death, love, joy, loss etc through theatrical and humorous compositions. Each object inherits a life of their own but in all reveal the lives and heavy emotions of everyday people themselves. Yu believes the objects he picks for his projects are each special in their own way and is rather fond of objects that once had a place in his childhood. He has continued to explore the relationship between objects and people through observation of daily routine, reflected identities and his own memories and is eager to expand his reach to objects he has briefly interacted with to things he hasn’t yet touched.