DIRECTOR BIOGRAPHY - Meixuan Li

Meixuan Li is a Chinese filmmaker and animation director whose work explores identity, transformation, self-perception, and the complex relationship between the individual and society. Working within the field of animation and digital art, Li combines imaginative storytelling with metaphorical and visually distinctive approaches to contemporary themes. Li directed and wrote So Shiny, So Well Shaped (2025), an 8-minute 2D digital animation produced through the Communication University of China’s Animation and Digital Art School. The film follows Salome, a mermaid who becomes obsessed with attaining a human identity and ultimately takes extreme measures to distance himself from his own nature. His pursuit of transformation leads to a tragic confrontation with the identity he has attempted to leave behind. Through the story’s fantastical premise, Li examines the desire to conform, the pressure to attain a particular status or ideal, and the consequences of rejecting one’s own identity. The film uses the figure of the mermaid as a metaphor for alienation and the often painful pursuit of belonging, turning a mythical narrative into a reflection on contemporary questions of selfhood and acceptance. So Shiny, So Well Shaped has been presented internationally, including selections at MONSTRA – Lisbon Animation Festival and the International Trickfilm-Festival Stuttgart (ITFS) in 2026, as well as the Tel Aviv International Student Film Festival. With a practice rooted in animation and visual storytelling, Meixuan Li represents an emerging generation of Chinese filmmakers exploring personal and social questions through imaginative cinematic forms.