Lu Yang (Chinese, b. 1984)works across 3D animation, video game engines, motion capture and virtual reality, fusing Buddhist philosophy, neuroscience and the visual language of anime and video games into immersive digital worlds.,Since the late 2010s much of this practice has centered on DOKU, a genderless digital avatar built from motion capture,which Lu Yang has described as a reincarnation of herself in a parallel universe.
Lu Yang was born in Shanghai and studied in the new media department of the China Academy of Art in Hangzhou, earning a bachelor's and a master's degree under video artist Zhang Peili.,,Her early work engaged bioart, incorporating biological matter and images of the body into installations shown across China's alternative art spaces before her practice turned to digital animation.The 2011 video Wrathful King Kong Core paired the wrathful deities of Tibetan Buddhism with neuroscience research on the biological mechanisms of anger.In 2015 she cast herself as a character for the first time in Delusional Mandala, shown as part of China's national presentation at the 56th Venice Biennale.,
Lu Yang developed DOKU using motion capture recorded from professional dancers, producing six versions of the avatar that correspond to the six realms of reincarnation in Buddhist cosmology.DOKU crossed into popular culture in 2020, appearing in the music video for The 1975's song Playing on My Mindand starring as a virtual spokesmodel for the Chinese sportswear brand Li-Ning at Paris Fashion Week.
In 2022 the Zabludowicz Collection in London gave Lu Yang her first solo exhibition in the United Kingdom, “LuYang NetiNeti”, built around DOKU the self, a video first shown that year in the Venice Biennale exhibition “The Milk of Dreams”.,That same year Deutsche Bank named her Artist of the Year.Her video installation DOKU The Flow, made with the game engine Unreal Engine,opened the K11 Hybrid Art and Cultural Centre in Shenzhen in 2024and was later shown in “What a Wonderful World: An Audiovisual Poem”, an exhibition of Julia Stoschek's video art collection at the Variety Arts Theater in Los Angeles.,In September 2025 the Museum of the Moving Image in New York gave The Great Adventure of Material World its first United States museum installation,shown alongside Lu Yang's concurrent survey exhibition “DOKU! DOKU! DOKU!: samsara.exe” at Amant.From May to October 2026 the Fondation Louis Vuitton presented Lu Yang's solo exhibition “DOKU The Illusion” at Espace Louis Vuitton in Venice, timed to the 61st Venice Biennale.,
