Yu Rong
Artist · Educator · Designer
Yu is a New York–based multidisciplinary artist working across painting, sculpture, craft, and design. Drawing from global art traditions and contemporary practices, her work is thoughtful, experimental, and grounded in material exploration. In addition to her studio practice, she designs handmade functional products, including items for pets.
About YuRong
Yu holds a BFA in Product Design from Parsons School of Design and an MFA in Painting from the New York Studio School. She began her artistic training at an early age in Chinese painting and later expanded into Western mediums such as oil, watercolor, egg tempera, encaustic, and printmaking. Her education includes both formal training and independent study across studios and institutions in the United States, China, and Europe.
Her work has been exhibited at Ceres Gallery in New York, ARC Gallery in Chicago, and CREATE Council in the Catskills, as well as internationally at Milan Design Week, London Design Fair, and Prague Design Week, where her wine goblet design After 5 PM was featured. Her practice spans diverse materials and techniques, including oil painting, encaustic, egg tempera, Chinese ink, silverpoint, cyanotype, water marbling, ceramics, glass, metal, and textile processes, alongside functional design projects ranging from toys and pet clothing to furniture and kitchenware.
Alongside her artistic practice, Yu is an active educator committed to community engagement. She teaches at the Museum of Chinese in America (MOCA), where she leads MOCAcreate, a family program introducing Chinese painting, calligraphy, and hands-on art-making. She has also led workshops and corporate creative programs for institutions and organizations including Columbia University, Google, Apple, Microsoft, Pinterest, Spectrum, the World Trade Center, Pfizer, ZipRecruiter, LinkedIn, Wieden+Kennedy, AboveGroup, Kansas City Public Library, and Ridgewood Public Library.
Yu’s work is rooted in a dialogue between tradition and experimentation. She draws inspiration from historical art forms and the uninhibited creativity of childhood, using both as a foundation to explore how cultural histories and material processes shape expression, connection, and imagination.
