The Ohio Artist Registry (OAR) is an exciting opportunity for artists to share their work, connect with the creative community, and establish an online presence—all on a free, virtual platform! The OAR encourages artists working in all art forms, throughout Ohio and beyond, to create a profile, which allows them to better promote themselves and their work. Being listed in the OAR provides artists with new opportunities to share their work with clients, galleries, patrons, and audiences. A listing in the OAR does not confer an endorsement, approval, or verification by the Ohio Arts Council.
For more information, contact Kathy Signorino, artist programs director, at kathy.signorino@oac.ohio.gov or 614-728-6140.
2025 Ohio Artist Registry Juried Exhibition
Yingqi Wu
Columbus Ohio 43221 United States
Bio
A scientist before an artist –
I was born in an industrialized city in east China. At age of 18, I left my hometown for academic and professional path on science and technology. After Bachelor of Engineering, I received fellowship from The Ohio State University, conducting interdisciplinary research of electronic material. With Master of Science in chemistry, my professional journey started as a scientist at CAS, the world’s largest chemistry-related information provider. I have built a career in operations, product development, data management, AI/ML solutions, and technology. Ten years after graduation, I returned to OSU Fisher Business School for an MBA degree.
In early 2025 I accidentally made my first painting at a charity event and have been painting in my spare time. In the absence of formal art training, I find myself driven by expression of emotions in combination of painting and writing. I paint what I feel by visually connecting components of what I see over time and across space. I painted about 15 paintings in 5 months. They hold a special place in my heart not only because these first paintings originated from a unique period of my life, they also have guided me to the light and kept my heart as it has always been.
Artist Statement
“Pay attention to what moves our heart”
With two suitcases in my hands and $2,000 cash in my pocket, I flew across the Pacific Ocean with a student visa and landed here in early 2000s.
Distance and time play tricks on our mind. 20+ years have made this place my home, while the home a half earth away feels like a lifetime ago.
Life usually throws us a curveball. In this foreign land, I have experienced tremendous opportunities of career and life growth, cozy family, sacred friendship, fairytale love, as well as sadness with heartaches.
What we get to retain in life is a luxury, what remains in our heart is a blessing. Life is a journey, it’s beautiful because we never know where it leads us.
“So instead of succumbing to homesickness, I said to myself, one’s country or native land is everywhere. So instead of giving way to despair, I took the way of active melancholy as long as I had strength for activity, or in other words, I preferred the melancholy that hopes and aspires and searches to the one that despairs, mournful and stagnant.”
– Vincent van Gogh’s letter to Theo. June 1880
