Today we’d like to introduce you to Yijia Xie.
Hi Yijia, thanks for joining us today. We’d love for you to start by introducing yourself.
I’m Yijia Xie, and I also go by Aqua. I’m a Chinese visual designer, creative coder, and futurist interested in branding, creative coding, and typography. I work with creative agencies and tech companies/startups to help them bring distinctive ideas into life with design and technology. I currently work at IBM Research as a brand designer, and previously I worked at &Walsh as a graphic designer. After studying the design class with Jessica Walsh at the School of Visual Arts in my junior year, I got the chance to intern at Sagmeister&Walsh and became a graphic designer afterward. During the two years working there, I had opportunities to work with lots of DTC and tech clients. In the super fast-paced work environment, I enhanced my design ability rapidly and established my aesthetic of style and pursuit of the uniqueness of the brand’s soul.
As for my current job, working in IBM research as a brand designer allows me to explore technology, the future, and design in depth. I have the freedom to explore the possibilities of creating a modern, innovative, and fresh brand identity for the giant tech company’s new organization. I work closely with scientists and the latest technologies in quantum computing, AI, blockchain, etc.
The daily contents I work on remind me of my childhood dream. I’ve been a big fan of archaeology documentaries, science fiction movies, and history books since I was a kid. I felt I could connect to the ancient wisdom in some way. I always dreamed about the outside of the universe and the looking of future society. Because of childhood fantasies about the ancient civilization and the future world, continuing to think about the connection between the humanities and the future runs through me growing up.
I’m sure you wouldn’t say it’s been obstacle free, but so far would you say the journey have been a fairly smooth road?
No, it wasn’t all smooth, of course. It was a pretty difficult time that I struggled with myself. I work in a very competitive design industry, surrounded by top world-class designers. For a long time, I always felt like I’m not cool enough to fit in. And at the beginning of my career, I was full of self-doubt.
Then the pandemic started: It was also a massive trauma for me. I lived alone in a small apartment in Brooklyn during the lockdown. With anxiety and uncertainty about the future, I long for inner peace. I came into the art of algorithms at work by chance. Then the new territory of generative art immediately ignited my interest. So I started to teach myself programming courses online frantically. The process of my generative art does not depend solely on computing, and it also includes combining various techniques, such as P5js, Machine Learning, AI, music, graphic design, typography, history, etc. AI computing expanded my design possibilities infinitely. They brought me hopes for the future as a human being suffering from the pandemic era and broadened my designer mind about the future of generative art. So learning and creating computing art has undoubtedly become a sanctuary for my soul during those difficult days.
In addition to studying and creating, I also did a lot of meditation and self-awareness during the pandemic, then I slowly healed myself. I stopped self-doubt and started posting my work and voice on social media. I’m on the way to reconciling with myself. I give up on being one of the “cool designers”, and what I do believe now is “Being myself is cool enough.”
Thanks for sharing that. So, maybe next you can tell us a bit more about your work?
With a background studying psychology major at the University of Washington and a working experience in the design industry, My work uniquely blends creative, humanistic, and technical skills. I love experimenting with the intersections of art and technology. I always feel amazed by my strong learning ability, allowing me to pick up some new tools quickly. So I am very good at combining various technologies to compose the new design forms. To be honest, I’m not particularly eager to define myself with a specific style. And I’m obsessed with utilizing all of the possibilities to discover the certain topics I always care about, such as futurism, spiritual journey, history, and technology.
Can you tell us more about what you were like growing up?
I just started a daily personal project for my mental health. Since things outside are turbulent, It’s frustrating that we could barely make a difference as normal individuals. I think at least I could do something for myself or others who feel related. So I’m creating a series of joyful and calm videos for my meditation purposes. All of the arts are generated by artificial intelligence technology. The world outside is turbulent, but I found beautiful peace in the zoom of programming.
Contact Info:
- Email: [email protected]
- Website: https://www.aquaxie.com
- Instagram: aqua.xie
Image Credits
Yijia Xie
