Echoes of Nature

Nan Liu is an associate professor with the visual arts department at Florida Agricultural & Mechanical University. He currently teaches drawing, painting, and art education courses. Nan’s artworks have been exhibited across the United States among public institutes, museums, and galleries. Many of his paintings and drawings have been collected by private patrons. Nan has won many awards from various regional and national art exhibitions.

Nan began to study Chinese brush painting and calligraphy at a very young age in Tianjin, China. At the age of 16, Nan was named the winner of the prestigious title, “Young Artist of Tianjin” by the Cultural Committee of Tianjin City. In 1992, he was admitted to the Oriental Art Department of Nan Kai University to study Chinese brush painting under the tutelage of the renowned contemporary Chinese painter Fan Zeng. He continued his graduate study in art education at Capital Normal University in Beijing and came to the United States and studied art education at the University of Arkansas at Little Rock in pursuit of his Master of Arts degree in 1999. Later, Nan earned a dual degree of Master of Fine Arts degree in painting and a Ph.D. in art education at Florida State University.

As an emerging artist, Nan has explored various art forms in recent years, including drawing, watercolor, tempera and oil painting. The subjects range from still life, figures, and landscape. Nan’s artwork promotes natural and simple artistic expression. In recent paintings, Nan has created a series of life-sized figurative oil paintings featuring his students and their campus life at Florida Agricultural & Mechanical University.

Nan is also dedicated to introducing traditional Chinese arts to the public in North America. He has done numerous presentations on Chinese brush painting and calligraphy at universities, museums, public schools, conferences and symposiums across the country. His hands-on lectures have reached all age-level groups, from kindergarten to senior citizens.

Haiqiong Deng is a performer on the traditional Chinese instrument the zheng (or guzheng). She was the recipient of the Florida Folk Heritage Award (2017), the Florida Individual Artist Fellowship (2013), and the Master Artist of the Florida Folklife Apprenticeship Award (2012). She was also the winner of the Outstanding Performance Prize at the Chinese National Zheng Competition in Shanghai 1995. Both of her CDs, “Mountain, Water, Sentiments - Traditional Chinese Zheng Masterpieces Performance by Haiqiong Deng” and “Echoes of Strings - Classical Indian Music by Sitar and Zheng” were nominated for the 13th Annual Independent Music Awards in “World Traditional” Category in 2014.

As an international renowned zheng soloist and chamber musician, Haiqiong has given numerous performances and lectures at concert halls, universities, museums, and festivals throughout the United States, Canada, China, Japan, and Singapore. Her discography ranges from solo, ensemble, concerto, and cross-cultural works. She is also the featured artist in the chapter on Chinese music in the widely used textbook World Music: Traditions and Transformations (McGraw-Hill, 2007), by Michael B. Bakan.

Haiqiong received her Bachelor of Music from the Shanghai Conservatory of Music and Master of Arts in Arts Administration and Ethnomusicology from the Florida State University College of Music. She is currently the Director of the FSU Chinese Music Ensemble and a Ph.D. Candidate in Musicology at the Florida State University.