Fan Yan

Fan Yan has been a viola player in the Hong Kong Philharmonic Orchestra for over 20 years. She is now pursuing her first love, painting, and making a name for herself as a local artist. She is becoming known for her innovative and unique use of inks and watercolour on rice paper. 

Her mixed musical and artistic heritage enables her to uncover connections between the visual renditions of her ink paintings and the audio renditions of classical music. To create this link, Fan Yan folds and dyes rice paper to divulge patterns reflective of the repetitive nature of musical scores. 

In 2020, she developed a music series called Polyphonies, where paintings reveal the inner order of harmony and discord in classical music. This series won several awards, including the UOB Art Academy’s Art in Ink 2020 and an Ink Global 2020 award.

In 2022, the French May Art Festival invited her to present her first solo exhibition, “Sound Maps.” These paintings take the viewer on a visual and audio journey guided by ink and watercolour patterns reflecting classical music scores. 

In 2023, she completed a second French May solo exhibition, “Jeux Théme et Variation”, presented by Alisan Fine Art. 

Fan Yan has shown her works at major art fairs, including Art Central 2021, and Ink Asia in 2023. Fine art Asia 2024 installation: Music Practice Room.

Her work has been collected by UOB Bank, Cathay Pacific Airlines, Sun Hong Kai Properties Co., and private art collectors from Hong Kong and worldwide.

https://www.cathaypacific.com/cx/en_HK/inspiration/cathay-stories/gallery-in-the-skies-fan-yan.html

SELECTED EXHIBITIONS & AWARDS

2025 Hong Kong Fine Art Asia

2024 “Installation: Music Practice Room”, Fine Art Asia, Hong Kong

2023 Solo Exhibition, “Jeux Thèmes Variations”, Associated project of Le French May, Alison Fine Arts, Hong Kong

2022 Group Exhibition, “Light Up”, Hong Kong Arts Centre, Hong Kong

2022 French May Arts Festival 2022, Hong Kong

2021 Solo Exhibition, “Polyphony”, Tai Kwun, Hong Kong

2021 “2020” awarded by UOB Art Academy’s Art in Ink bronze awards 2020

2020 Collected as one of the Global 500 Ink Painting of the year

2019 Singapore Affordable Art Fair, Singapore

2018 Hong Kong Contemporary Female Artist Exhibition in St. Petersburg, Russia