Welcome to my portfolio, I'm Jiatao Xu. I also work under the alias of "Rukul". I'm currently attending SJSU majoring in Studio Art Practice

 I'm an interdisciplinary artist who works across both traditional and digital media. I'm always willing to explore, learn new skills, and incorporate them into my creative process.

 When I was a child, I was heavily influenced by Chinese and Japanese comics. I had always wanted to become a comic book illustrator, a storyteller creating narratives of heroes fighting villains or spectacular adventures in fantasy land. This has been the core of my creative process: to build a narrative through my work.

 The computer has been a significant part of life since I was first introduced to it around the age of seven. However, it had never occurred to me to use it as a tool to create something meaningful. As I grew older, I was able to invest more time and attention into making art. This was also the time when I was financially capable of owning my computer and a drawing tablet. I was then introduced to digital art. Drawing has become a bridge between the old world (traditional media) and the new world (digital space). As I was familiarizing myself with digital illustration, I also grew interested in other media, such as programming, 3D modeling, and video game design. As the information superhighway feeds my brain with more information, my interest grew and persuaded me to go out of my comfort zone and try new things. I first took a photography class at school, followed by graphic design and programming. I have become aware of my composition, articulation of strokes, and the expression of ideas. Most importantly, I seriously consider choosing art as my future career.

 Most of my current work is centered around mental issues, such as anxiety, depression, and feeling lost, as pressure from college piles up. For example, Low Sanity, The Corona Situation, and Mushroom all revolve around those ideas. I want to use my works to present to the audience how hard feelings are and raise awareness of those issues. The mere exchanges between people with these struggles often would relax their anxiety. Moreover, I also use the process of creating art on mental matters to cope with my own anxieties. Besides mental issues, I also create sketches and concept art for my two ongoing world-building projects (one set in a fantasy background, the other set in a grim dystopian future). The fantasy is still in the preliminary stages. On the other hand, dystopian is an imagination of what if humanity did everything wrong. The worst-case scenario, albeit highly exaggerated, I hope it will serve as a warning to mankind and reflect my disillusionment toward humanity working together as one organized structure.

 In the future, I would like to familiarize myself with 3D modeling and incorporate 3D design into my workflow. I would also like to work with contemporary media such as virtual reality and explore its possibilities in storytelling. I will continue to build my world and express myself through my works.

You can find me on Github (https://github.com/jiataoxu) and Artstation (https://www.artstation.com/rukul )

Contact Info: jiatao.xu@sjsu.edu