Winnie Weiyun Szu (司惟云) is a Taiwanese artist based in Chicago.
I make paintings about the weather.
Not really specific places, but the feeling of being in it, light changing, wind drifting, something passing through. I don’t try to capture an image. I don’t have one in me. I paint to figure out where I am while I’m making.
I’m a Taiwanese artist, and a lot of my work comes from not feeling fully grounded, from being lost. I grew up between cultures, places, and languages, and I can’t really think in images or even in words. Because of that, I rely on abstraction to stay present, using color as anchor points within everything that keeps shifting.
I find solace in the rhythm of nature, staring at the sun and moon near the horizon, feeling the humidity settle with the seasons, sensing the quiet pull of something greater. These moments linger in my work as abstractions, atmospheres, as air.
I work with gauze, distemper, ink, and light. I stain the fabric and layer calligraphic marks, working with cadence and lightness, letting the painting shift and grow as I follow it. The paintings sometimes look like landscapes, but they’re not about land. I think of them as landscapes of nowhere—closer to weather than location.
I want the paintings to be open, to be something you don’t have to make sense of. Like looking at the sky, or standing by water, or noticing how the moon rises without really thinking about it, moments we know so well, without needing to name.
My work doesn’t try to resolve ambiguities, but to revel in their vitality.
Winnie Weiyun Szu
b.2001
Education:
2026: MFA Painting and Drawing, School of the Art Institute of Chicago, USA
2024: MFA Fine Art, Taipei National University of Art, Taiwan
2024: BA (Hons) Fine Art exchange program, Chelsea College of Arts.
University of the Arts London, United Kingdom.
2023: BFA Fine Art, Taipei National University of Art, Taiwan
Solo and Duo Exhibitions:
2025 知無不言: Let Me Tell You All I Can, SITE Sharp Gallery, Chicago, IL
2024 ‘Wind, wind, blowing free’, NTHU Ze Art Space, Hsinchu, Taiwan
2022 A Clean Well Lighted Place, TNUA South-North Gallery, Taipei, Taiwan
2019 Come Take the Test with a 97-point Bento, Haiton Art Center, Taipei, Taiwan
Screenings and Performances:
2025 ‘the mediacircus and its double//dip in the lake’ with //sense,
Historic Black Mountain College, Asheville, NC
2021 ‘Taoyuan City Documentary Film Festival’,
Zhongli Lights and Shadow Film Center, Taoyuan
2021 ‘Mirror at Hand’ Three Intertwined Views of Women,
photography and their lifeline screening, Taoyuan
Group Exhibitions:
2024 ‘FISSURES’, SAIC 33 building, Chicago, IL
2025 ‘Desperate Connections’, Ox-Bow School of Art, Saugatuck, MI
2025 ‘Ignite Peoria’ with //sense, Peoria Civic Center, Peoria, IL
2025 ‘They are always somewhere’, Hermit Gallery, Taipei
2025 ‘Drown-Proofing’, Epiphany Center for the Arts, Chicago, IL
2025 ‘Threadings’, Parlour and Ramp, Chicago, IL
2025 ‘Are We Here Yet’, Oh Art Foundation, Zhou B Art Center, Chicago, IL
2025 ‘W/E Western/Eastern’, Side Street Studio Arts, Chicago, IL
2025 ‘Self-Made: Narratives of Knowing and Being’, EXPO CHICAGO, Chicago, IL
2025 ‘juicy’, Purple Window Gallery, Chicago, IL
2025 ‘Ten Out of Ten’, Hermit Gallery, Taipei
2024 ‘What’s in a Name’, SAIC 33 building, Chicago, IL
2024 ‘Bioconstellation’, SAIC Maclean, Chicago, IL
2024 ‘Skew the Scale’, the Siragusa Gallery, Chicago, IL
2024 ‘EON’, Keelung Museum of Art, Keelung
2024 ‘GPT4’, Cultural and Creative Industry Park, New Taipei
2023 ‘PK: restart’, Cultural and Creative Industry Park, New Taipei
2023 ‘LUNATION II’, GREENhaus garden, London
2023 ‘Missed Letters’, Making Space gallery, London
2023 ‘Y’, Chelsea The Triangle Space, London
2023 ‘Traversing x Networking’, Capital Art Center, Taipei
2023 ‘Painting World’, TNUA Bookshop 284 space, Taipei
2023 ‘A Place Without Map’, TNUA Underground Museum, Taipei
2023 ‘Taiwan Royal Academy Winter Exhibition’, Taipei Artist Village, Taipei
2022 ‘Nomadic Playground - Fringe Art Project’, Yuanshan Riverside Park, Taipei
2021 ‘Why no open camera?’, TNUA Underground Museum, Taipei
2021 ‘Misaki Nanako No gorgeous life’, TNUA South-North Art Gallery, Taipei
2021 ‘Cross Border, Love for Freedom Calligraphy Art Festival’, Taipei Artist Village, Taipei
2021 ‘That Doge’, Cultural and Creative Industry Park, New Taipei
2017 ‘We kept some Dogs and named them Cat’, Yongping White Jade Gallery, New Taipei
Publications, Press, and Media:
2025 New American Paintings MFA Annual Issue #177
2024 Taishin ARTalks - There are stars twinkling in the eyes - Weiyun Szu and Lin Wenchun double solo exhibition "Wind, wind, blowing free":https://talks.taishinart.org.tw/talks/461/38601
China Times - Starting from the notion of family to seek lost love, Winnie Weiyun Szu endeavors to challenge the concept of perfection through bold and innovative creations:
https://www.chinatimes.com/campus/20240823003097-262311
2021 Taishin ARTalks - Houliao On-Site Creation Project: https://archive.taishinart.org.tw/juries/kch/2021013002
2019 Taishin ARTalks - Hai Tong Art Center: "Come Get a 97-Point Bento": https://talks.taishinart.org.tw/event/talks/2019070502