Yang Li is a Chinese fashion designer based in London. He currently is the

creative director A creative director (or creative supervisor) is a person who makes high-level creative decisions and, with those decisions, oversees the creation of creative assets such as advertisements, products, events, or logos. Creative director positions ar ...

of Shang Xia.

Early life

Li was born and lived in

Beijing } Beijing ( ; ; ), alternatively romanized as Peking ( ), is the capital of the People's Republic of China. It is the center of power and development of the country. Beijing is the world's most populous national capital city, with over 21 ...

, until moving to

Perth Perth is the capital and largest city of the Australian state of Western Australia. It is the fourth most populous city in Australia and Oceania, with a population of 2.1 million (80% of the state) living in Greater Perth in 2020. Perth is ...

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a Sovereign state, sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous List of islands of Australia, sma ...

at age 10. Li spent his isolated teenage years playing basketball and

skateboarding Skateboarding is an extreme sport, action sport originating in the United States that involves riding and performing tricks using a skateboard, as well as a recreational activity, an art form, an entertainment industry Profession, job, and a ...

, two sports whose style and expression through clothing were his first introduction to fashion. Music has been the most profound obsession of Yang Li numerous collaborations have resulted and Li has led the way in championing underground and cult artists.

Career

Li dabbled in music and briefly studied law to please his parents, but ultimately decided to pursue fashion. Upon receiving a scholarship to

Central Saint Martins Central Saint Martins is a public tertiary art school in London, England. It is a constituent college of the University of the Arts London. It offers full-time courses at foundation, undergraduate and postgraduate levels, and a variety of shor ...

in 2007, Li moved to London to study fashion. After an internship under English designer

Gareth Pugh Gareth Pugh (born 31 August 1981) is an English fashion designer"Gareth Pugh: Fashion Designer."

, Li withdrew from the institution and moved to Belgium to intern under fashion designer

Raf Simons Raf Jan Simons (; born 12 January 1968) is a Belgian fashion designer. Beginning in furniture design, Simons launched his own menswear label in 1995. He was creative director at Jil Sander (2005–2012), Christian Dior (2012–2015), and Calvin K ...

. Following his experience described as "working in a creative kitchen", he launched his eponymous label in 2010. Li's first collection "Zero Hour", released in 2010, was shown through a short film in collaboration with filmmaker and photographer Scott Trindle, in which articles of clothing were cut and repaired in varying degrees, which he saw as an act of "subtle rebellion". He proceeded to release three more collections before his Fall/Winter 2013 Paris debut women's collection, a show dubbed "phenomenal" by ''

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''. In 2014, he was shortlisted for the

LVMH LVMH Moët Hennessy Louis Vuitton (), commonly known as LVMH, is a French holding multinational corporation and conglomerate specializing in luxury goods, headquartered in Paris. The company was formed in 1987 through the merger of fashion house ...

prize. CLCC SA, a Luxembourg fashion fund who had also funded

, made investments in Yang Li in 2015. Li debuted his menswear line in January 2016 for Paris Fashion Week. In 2017, he launched his collaboration label SAMIZDAT. Li is known for working with underground and cult musicians. For Li's Spring/Summer 2018 collection, the designer partnered with American singer-songwriter

Michael Gira Michael Rolfe Gira (; born February 19, 1954) is an American singer-songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, author and artist. He is the main force behind the New York City musical group Swans and fronted Angels of Light. He is also the founder of ...

for a live performance to accompany his runway show at

Palais de Tokyo The Palais de Tokyo (''Tokyo Palace'') is a building dedicated to modern and contemporary art, located at 13 avenue du Président-Wilson, facing the Trocadéro, in the 16th arrondissement of Paris. The eastern wing of the building belongs to ...

in Paris. Other music collaborations include

Blixa Bargeld Blixa Bargeld (born Christian Emmerich, 12 January 1959) is a German musician who has been the lead singer of the band Einstürzende Neubauten since its formation in 1980. Bargeld was also a founding member of the Australian rock band Nick Cave a ...

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Keiji Haino Keiji Haino ( ''Haino Keiji''; born May 3, 1952) is a Japanese musician and singer-songwriter whose work has included rock, free improvisation, noise music, percussion, psychedelic music, minimalism and drone music. He has been active since the ...

Jehnny Beth Jehnny Beth (born Camille Berthomier, 24 December 1984), is a French musician, singer-songwriter, producer, presenter and actress, best known as half of the duo John & Jehn and front woman of the English rock band Savages. Her debut solo album ...

, Genesis Porridge, Psychic TV,

Ramleh Ramla or Ramle ( he, רַמְלָה, ''Ramlā''; ar, الرملة, ''ar-Ramleh'') is a city in the Central District of Israel. Today, Ramle is one of Israel's mixed cities, with both a significant Jewish and Arab populations. The city was f ...

KK Null , known by his stage name KK Null, is a Japanese experimental multi-instrumentalist active since the early 1980s. He began as a guitarist but learned how to compose, sing, play drums, and create electronic music. He also studied Butoh dance at ...

, and

Pharmakon In critical theory, pharmakon is a concept introduced by Jacques Derrida. It is derived from the Greek source term φάρμακον (''phármakon''), a word that can mean either remedy, poison, or scapegoat. In his essay "Plato's Pharmacy", Der ...

Automatic show

In 2018 Li debuted the "automatic show", ceding control of the FW19 visual presentation to his models. Li invited friends of the likes of

Stoya Stoya is an American pornographic actress, actress, model, and writer. Early life Stoya was born to a Scottish father and a Serbian mother. As a child, she wanted to become a dancer, and started dance lessons at the age of three. She was hom ...

Asia Argento Asia Argento (; born Aria Maria Vittoria Rossa Argento; 20 September 1975) is an Italian actress and filmmaker. The daughter of filmmaker Dario Argento, she has had roles in several of her father's features and achieved mainstream success with a ...

Ali Michael Alexandra Nicole Michael (born May 15, 1990 in Colleyville, Texas), is an American model. Early life Ali Michael grew up in Colleyville, Texas. Her career began after winning the Fashion!Dallas/Kim Dawson Model Search contest in 2005 at age 15. ...

Ruby Aldridge Ruby Rose Aldridge (born August 26, 1991) is an American fashion model and singer. During the years of 2008 - 2012, Ruby Aldridge was the "face" of brands such as Coach, Marc by Marc Jacobs, Valentino, and Calvin Klein. During the 2011 fall fash ...

Lily McMenamy Lily Camille McMenamy (born 3 April 1994) is an American-born English model and actress. Early life McMenamy was born in Pennsylvania. Her mother, Kristen McMenamy, was one of the world's top models during the 1990s. Her father, Hubert Boukob ...

, Gaia Orgeas, Savages frontwoman

Rossy de Palma Rosa Elena García Echave (born 16 September 1964), known professionally as Rossy de Palma, is a Spanish actress and model. She is well known for her roles in films by Pedro Almodóvar such as ''Law of Desire'', ''Women on the Verge of a Nervou ...

, Irina Shnitman, Sasha Melnychuk, Ellie Grace Cumming and

Genesis P-Orridge Genesis Breyer P-Orridge (born Neil Andrew Megson; 22 February 1950 – 14 March 2020) was a singer-songwriter, musician, poet, performance artist, visual artist, and occultist who rose to notoriety as the founder of the COUM Transmissions arti ...

to communicate the collection in their own way, began simultaneously posting selfies on

Instagram Instagram is a photo and video sharing social networking service owned by American company Meta Platforms. The app allows users to upload media that can be edited with filters and organized by hashtags and geographical tagging. Posts can ...

from 10 different cities garbed in various looks of Li’s AW19 collection, all combined it was the whole of the collection. “Automatic Show” was a

selfie A selfie () is a self-portrait photograph, typically taken with a digital camera or smartphone, which may be held in the hand or supported by a selfie stick. Selfies are often shared on social media, via social networking services such as F ...

salvo that relied completely on the participation of its models, Of course skirting convention runs the risk of going all but unnoticed; that didn’t happen, it created an instant viral digital fashion show Li says that he was inspired by the disjointed prose of American writer

William S. Burroughs William Seward Burroughs II (; February 5, 1914 – August 2, 1997) was an American writer and visual artist, widely considered a primary figure of the Beat Generation and a major postmodern author who influenced popular cultur ...

, who was known for championing an unconscious and "automatic" style of writing in his work. resulting in the following YANG LI AUTOMATIC MANIFESTO Li said: The show was critically acclaimed and received overwhelming attention across the industry
models.com
citing it as one of the coolest show of the season The following year in 2019, Li extended his exploration of formats with a 3D virtual meets live show in collaboration with

The Jesus and Mary Chain The Jesus and Mary Chain are a Scottish alternative rock band formed in East Kilbride in 1983. The band revolves around the songwriting partnership of brothers Jim and William Reid. After signing to independent label Creation Records, they rele ...

. Yang Li presented his collection titled Greatest Hits: Automatic Show II at La Gaîté Lyrique. The show was a part concert, part visual experience through the digital projections which featured a 3D scanned version of Ruby Aldridge and Wolf Gillespie who modelled the collection in a virtual video game like environment, mirrored in a 360 view across the venue in collaboration with

SHOWstudio Nicholas David Gordon Knight Order of the British Empire, OBE (born 24 November 1958) is a British fashion photography, fashion photographer and founder and director of SHOWstudio.com. He is an honorary professor at University of the Arts London ...

and AGUSTA YR, the show also featured a live performance by

. Li's work has attracted a number of highly influential stockists, including

SSENSE SSENSE is a multi-brand retailer based in Montreal, Canada specialising in the sale of Designer clothing, designer fashion and high end streetwear. It was founded as an e-commerce platform in 2003 by three brothers: Rami, Bassel and Firas Atalla ...

Farfetch Farfetch is a British-Portuguese online luxury fashion retail platform that sells products from over 700 boutiques and brands from around the world. The company was founded in 2007 by the Portuguese entrepreneur José Neves with its headquarters ...

Dover Street Market Dover Street Market is a multi-brand retailer originally located on Dover Street, in Mayfair, London. It has stores in New York City, Tokyo, Singapore, Beijing and Los Angeles. Dover Street Market was created by Rei Kawakubo of Japanese fashion ...

, and LUISAVIAROMA.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Yang, Li Living people 1987 births