Creation at Your Fingertips

From a hobbyist to an entrepreneur with her own business, Gao Xiaolan has never stopped moving forward on the path of creativity. She left her hometown – Panjin City, Liaoning Province – for Beijing to pursue her dream of becoming a self-employed artist.

Natural Talent, Keen Interest

Many people would naturally think that Gao must have studied art from an early age, but in fact she never received any training. She started to make art simply because she is interested in it. “I have loved painting since I was little. I often made small items by using any materials available. My parents couldn’t afford to send me to art classes at that time, so I kept learning and exploring by myself,” she said with a smile. “I think I probably inherited some gifts from my father who was talented at traditional Chinese painting.”

Gao majored in pre-school education at a vocational school. She worked in a kindergarten for two years before resigning from her job in 2011. “I was not thinking about starting my own business when I quit my job,” she said. I just wanted to relax for a while. Luckily, I benefited a lot from the rapid development of We Media. The Internet provided a platform for me to become an independent artist.”

“Years ago, when Weibo [a Chinese social network and microblog] became popular, I often published photos of my works on my channel and interacted with other art lovers,” Gao recalled. “For a while I was fascinated by carving rubber stamps. Some netizens asked me about the price of my stamps after seeing my work, or asked me if I could create personalized stamps for them. From then on, my hobby brought me some income. Although it wasn’t much, I felt very happy.” Regardless of the varied requirements, Gao always strives for excellence during the production process. Her rubber stamps feature delicate lines and attractive color combinations and have caused a stir amongst netizens.

Giving Artworks “Soul”

Before using polymer clay, Gao began with super lightweight clay. After making comparisons, she found that polymer clay is better when modifying details. In 2013, she received two succulent plants as a gift from her friend. Looking at their fleshy leaves, she thought this juicy texture could be reproduced by using polymer clay, so she embarked on a round of experiments to make polymer clay succulents.

Gao’s handmade polymer clay desserts.

Polymer clay actually contains no clay minerals. It sets at a low temperature, which means you don’t need a kiln; any standard kitchen oven will do. Polymer clay, which looks like playdough, is said to have been invented by a German woman, who sold the formula to a company and that was how the earliest brand of polymer clay was created. As this material is easy to model, it soon became popular, and since then it has become popular with a large number of handicraft lovers.

The cultivation of succulent plants had just gained popularity in China, no one had attempted to reproduce them with polymer clay. Gao’s works immediately satisfied many netizens’ demand for novelty. “Since I started making succulents, the number of my followers on Weibo has constantly increased,” said Gao. “Later, I tried to model animated figures. Once I spent a whole week making ‘Toothless’ from the movie How to Train Your Dragon. I got a lot of likes, reposts and comments as soon as I published the photos, attracting more followers. Last year, I made ‘Baymax’ from the movie Big Hero 6, which turned out to be very popular too!”

Succulent plants handmade by Gao.

So how did Gao make her figures and their colors so lifelike? Gao explained that in addition to skills perfected by practice, artists put a lot of heart into their work. Here, “heart” refers to many things, such as love, childlike innocence, patience, and meticulous effort, which are all essential in the process of creation. “In fact, the artists’ nature and experiences, their angle on the world, as well as their attitude towards life will all be embodied in the details of their artworks. That is how artists give their work soul.”

Concentrating on Innovation

By 2014, Gao had reached a certain level of achievement in her art business. Looking for more room for development, she left her hometown Panjin for Beijing.

Living in a mega-city does create more opportunities: “A studio contacted me on Weibo, inviting me to give regular lectures on making succulent plants or felt items,” Gao said. “Some schools invited me to teach children how to make small items with polymer clay in their extracurricular classes. I also make bespoke items for clients based on their specifications. In my spare time, I try out new ideas and create more art pieces.” She added: “I never plan to move to other areas by utilizing the fame I gained. The process of creation brings me a sense of achievement and I enjoy making handicrafts with a calm and peaceful mind.”

As for the question of competition within the art world, Gao answered: “I will stick to innovation and constantly make progress, so I can make more and more objects that people will love. Moreover, I will never stop learning to enrich my mind and broaden my horizons. In addition to interests and persistence, artists must have original ideas.”

At regular intervals, Gao gives lectures in other cities, some she organizes herself, and others are organized by studios that partner with her. “I am encouraged by the enthusiasm of some of my students. Last year when I taught in Shanghai, a girl from Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, far from Shanghai in southern China, came especially just to attend the class. I saw her this year too when I had a class in Guangzhou City,” said Gao. She admitted that she enjoys every minute spent with handicraft amateurs and she would like to share all that she knows with her students. In August 2014, a handbook on polymeric clay creation, which Gao had carefully drafted, was published.

Gao’s ultimate ambition is to make “garage kits,” which are assembled scale model figures portraying humans or other living creatures such as anime characters. “That job means to make models of the details of different parts of a model figure and then to make molds, so that the mass production of those delicate figures will become possible,” Gao explained. But she said she still has a long way to go to reach this goal, because the process requires a lot of knowledge and skills in various fields. She said that she will keep studying and putting in the effort to practice in order to make her dream come true.