EP14｜A Poem in Cloth — Hu Chiung-pi on The Great Artist, stitching together the aesthetics of life through three-dimensional embroidery

A heart wrought in cloth, exhibited at the Shanghai art fair: a textile universe extending from painting to fashion design

[Taipei] In Episode 14 of The Great Artist, the podcast presented by DE Global Art Agency, the textile artist Hu Chiung-pi joins the programme. In this episode, she shares a creative journey of continually evolving mediums, and how, with soft cloth and fine needle and thread, she stitches together three-dimensional poems that bear the aesthetics of life.

Hu Chiung-pi's path in art is a journey from the flat surface towards the three-dimensional, one of ceaseless exploration. From childhood she began experimenting with different art forms, first setting out from painting, which cultivated her sensitivity to colour, composition and beauty; subsequently, she extended the reach of her creation into fashion design, beginning to ponder the relationships between cloth and the body, between textile and space; ultimately, she turned towards three-dimensional embroidery, taking needle and thread as her brush and cloth as her paper, developing a creative idiom entirely her own.

Among Hu Chiung-pi's works, none is more striking than her series of hearts wrought in cloth. In 2023, this work was exhibited at the Shanghai art fair, stitching from soft cloth the organ most emblematic of life, and deeply drawing the gaze of those present. This work, brimming with tension and poetry, not only drew the attention of the contemporary news radio of the Shanghai art fair, but also featured in the reporting of the Shanghai Contemporary Art News e-bulletin, allowing her creative idiom to transcend geography and win the notice of the international art world.

To present the most resilient of life's themes through the softest of materials is precisely the fascination of Hu Chiung-pi's work. In the eyes of most, cloth may be no more than an everyday material, yet in her hands it is transformed into an artistic medium bearing emotion, memory and the aesthetics of life. Every stitch, every thread, concentrates her delicate feeling for life and her profound contemplation; every three-dimensional embroidery work is like a silent poem written in cloth.

In this episode, Hu Chiung-pi shares the journey of her formation as an artist, and how she found her own creative position among painting, fashion design and three-dimensional embroidery. She speaks of how, for her, the choice of material is not merely a technical consideration but a form of emotional expression — soft cloth can come closest to the warmth and vitality she wishes to convey.

Her experience of exhibiting from Taiwan to Shanghai echoes the path of an international career that The Great Artist emphasises — rooted in craft of academic legitimacy, allowing singular and infectious local creation to cross borders and advance towards a larger stage, to be seen and moved by ever more people.

The Great Artist EP14 is now available on Apple Podcasts, SoundOn and other platforms, with a running time of approximately 31 minutes. Listeners are warmly invited to step into the textile universe Hu Chiung-pi weaves with needle and thread.