Cindy Hsu Zell is a Los Angeles based artist who has maintained a full time studio practice for over a decade. She grew up near the San Gabriel Mountains and studied fine art and animation at the University of Southern California. Her approach to art stems from this backdrop of nature and movement as well as a deep curiosity about form, texture, and finish.

Zell’s work is process and material-driven, with individual pieces serving as studies on gestures and perception. Ethereal finishes play with refraction and nostalgia, unsure if they're artifacts from a distant past or a far-off future. Inspired by the Light and Space movement of the 1960s-70s which emphasized atmospheric and sensorial experiences, her sculptures examine the playful dialogue between color, light, and shadow as they respond to, absorb, and reflect their surrounding spaces.

Her work has been acquired for private collections around the world and has been featured in Domino, Luxe, Dwell, and Surface magazines, as well as exhibited at Alcova Miami and the Affordable Art Fair in New York.

I make ceramic wall sculptures that explore gesture, memory, and surface. Some pieces rise from the wall in soft, curved forms shaped by gravity and touch, while others are paintings built from layers of glaze. Across both, reflective finishes catch and bend light, shifting between something tangible and something half-remembered.

My practice comes from a need to keep things I struggle to remember. I document my life through lists, archives, and notes, translating that impulse into physical form in the studio. The sculptural works hold small embraces in place, while the painted pieces follow fleeting images that blur, dissolve, and reappear through the kiln.

These works are my way of holding onto what would otherwise disappear.