About Artist

I create cyanotypes using sunlight, plants, and handmade chemistry to document something I believe we’re all craving right now: stillness, truth, and the kind of beauty that holds more than it shows.

My art is grounded in reverence — for nature, for memory, and for the quiet strength we don’t always talk about. I print wild grasses, invasive plants, and native flora because I see myself in them. They’re resilient. They don’t ask for permission to thrive. They adapt, take root, and flourish in unlikely places — just like I’ve had to.

I was born in Northern China, grew up in Beijing, and later studied in Thailand before moving to the U.S. in 2012. My roots stretch across continents, and like the plants I collect, I’ve had to shape-shift, survive, and rebuild. When I began printing mandalas during a painful turning point in my personal life, I realized this process wasn’t just creative — it was sacred. Each piece became a marker of healing. Not the kind you perform, but the kind you earn.

I don’t make art to decorate walls. I make art because I need to. It’s how I grieve. How I listen. How I transform pain into pattern, silence into language, and survival into something tangible. I only work in blue and white. The color blue has always felt like the ocean to me — open, vast, full of possibility and longing. It reminds me of a childhood story I read about a man drifting at sea, choosing not to look back. That’s the kind of courage I return to every time I make a piece.

My collectors are often women who’ve carried their own stories quietly. They find something in the work — strength, serenity, or memory. Some tell me it reminds them of their grandmother’s garden. Others say it’s the only thing that calms them after a long day. That kind of connection humbles me every time.

We’re living in a world that feels increasingly fractured — climate collapse, disconnection, and collective trauma. My work isn’t a solution to all that. But it’s a pause. A breath. A gentle resistance against forgetting what matters: nature, healing, and the unseen parts of ourselves.

Each cyanotype I make is an original, hand-printed blueprint of the natural world. I collect the plants myself — intentionally and intuitively—press them under glass, and expose the composition to sunlight. No two are ever the same. The result is a collaboration between earth, light, and human hands. I seal each one with my Mandarin name stamp — a mark of lineage, authorship, and love.

If you feel something when you see my work, you’re not alone. And maybe, that’s the point.

– Bo Sapphire