SISSI WHO?
Dr. Sissi Liu is a painter (under the brush name of Lusi Erling 鹿寺洱泠), composer, jewelry designer, and design and performance scholar. As a composer-lyricist and dramaturg, her work has been seen at the Carnegie Hall, Joe's Pub, the Juilliard School, Times Square Alliance, etc. Dr. Liu is a Rhode Island School of Design (RISD) certified designer. Her scholarly articles appear in leading peer-reviewed journals such as Theatre Topics and Performance Research. She holds a PhD in Theatre and Performance from The Graduate Center, City University of New York, and a Doctoral Certificate in Interactive Technology and Pedagogy (a.k.a. Digital Studies). She has taught at CUNY colleges and Brown University. Her book, Designturgy: The Drama of Design, will be published by Bloomsbury. Her paintings have been permanently collected by institutions and acquired by private collectors in the US and China.
An artist and scholar with an unflagging spirit of inquiry, Sissi is excited by, and draws connections among, wide ranging disciplines from rocket science to fragrance chemistry of trees to Song Dynasty Chinese paintings and ceramics.
She fights for the human race, and is compassionate toward those who cannot fight for themselves: the four-legged, the one-legged, the legless. She donates a percentage of all proceeds from the sale of her work to wildlife and plantation conservation.
She has volunteered for non-governmental organizations to end world poverty and for schools serving children with disabilities.
She sows hidden seeds of love within every soul her work reaches, whether through the written word, a stroke of the brush, or the swell of a song. She is a firm believer that a song, a book, or a canvas possesses the magical capacity to change the course of a life.