Xiaoyun Chen

Designer and Visual Artist

Making the Unseen Felt

Xiaoyun Chen is a designer and visual artist whose work explores how images can give form to feelings that are difficult to name. Moving between product design and visual art, she uses color, shape, space, and rhythm to create visual experiences that invite people to notice, sense, and interpret their inner worlds.

moodi — Emotional Frequencies

moodi — Emotional Frequencies is a multidisciplinary project about the ways emotion can be experienced before it can be put into words. Through illustration, digital experiences, and tactile interaction, Chen approaches emotion as something fluid and physical: a force that can expand, contract, erupt, settle, or drift.

At the heart of the project is a series of four works. Rather than illustrating emotions through characters or literal scenes, Chen gives each one its own visual logic, shaped by color, movement, density, and space.

Four Emotional States

Anger — Burst

Red fragments radiate from a central point, creating an explosive outward movement and a sense of energy breaking free.

Fear — Enclosure

Overlapping, plant-like forms fold inward. Their tightening layers create a compressed space that evokes the feeling of being surrounded.

Joy — Expansion

Bright, open space and botanical forms suggest lightness, growth, and the freedom to unfold.

Sadness — Drift

Cool blues and a downward visual movement create a feeling of slow drifting, suspension, and emotional weight.

Together, the works form a visual vocabulary for feelings that do not always arrive with clear names. They are not presented as problems to solve, but as states that can be encountered and understood in different ways. The work begins with perception and leaves room for each viewer to find a personal meaning.

From Image to Touch

moodi extends beyond the printed image through an interactive object that pairs an emotion cube with tactile domes. Visitors are invited to touch, compare, and make their own connections between what they see and what they feel. The experience brings emotional awareness into the body, turning looking into participation.

The project grew from an interest in emotional awareness in early childhood, while its central question reaches across ages: how do we recognize what we are feeling before we have the words to describe it? In Chen’s work, an image, a color, a rhythm, or a texture can offer a place to begin.

About Xiaoyun Chen

Based in San Jose, California, Xiaoyun Chen works across product design and visual art, with a focus on visual storytelling and the emotional potential of images. Her work has received recognition from the MUSE Design Awards, the International Design Awards (IDA), the iF Design Award, and the European Product Design Award (EPDA).

Chen’s work has been exhibited in London, Paris, and New York, including at Art Shopping Paris in the Carrousel du Louvre. She has also served as a juror for international design awards, including the CES Innovation Awards.

Exhibition

moodi — Emotional Frequencies was presented at Art Shopping Paris at the Carrousel du Louvre in Paris, April 10–12, 2026.

Project details: Illustration · Digital experience · Interactive installation