Yan Xing (born in 1986 in Chongqing, China) is a Chinese-American artist who currently resides in Brussels and Los Angeles. His artistic practice seamlessly encompasses sculpture, installation, performance art, video, photography, painting, and other mediums. Through his intricate body of work, he delves into the complex interplay between desire, sexuality, power, class, and social norms. Yan Xing's works frequently challenge prevailing moral patterns, and many of his symphony-like pieces approach exhibitions as materials, aiming to bridge the narrative traditions in the visual arts. His artistic process often begins or concludes with character storylines akin to those found in novels, with the materiality of his works serving as a reinforcing element for his storytelling. Additionally, he frequently engages with design, theater, film, literature, and other disciplines, amalgamating and juxtaposing diverse and complex cultural contexts.

Yan Xing was raised in Chongqing, a city in southwest China, during a period of significant reform and opening-up in the country. From 2009 to 2015, he resided and worked in Beijing before dividing his time between China and the United States. In his early works, Yan Xing skillfully incorporated fragments from Western films and literature that had been disseminated in Chinese society, weaving these elements into his art to explore the conflicts and dilemmas arising from the intersection of visual culture and the post-war order, drawing from his own semantic connections. Recently he has relocated to Brussels, where he has delved into media and technology from the early internet era, youth culture, resistance and consumption, and the overlapping and multifaceted realities encompassing trauma, marginality, and contemporary life. In doing so, he questions the historical significance and modern values attributed to individuals within a global context.

Yan Xing completed his Bachelor of Arts degree in the Oil Painting Department of the Sichuan Fine Arts Institute in 2009. He is a co-founder and member of the artist collective COMPANY. In 2012, Yan Xing received the Best Young Artist Award at the Chinese Contemporary Art Awards and was also nominated for the Future Generation Art Prize by the Pinchuk Art Centre, Kiev, in the same year.

Some of Yan Xing's notable solo exhibitions include Dangerous Afternoon, Kunsthalle Basel (2017), Yan Xing, Eli and Edythe Broad Art Museum, Michigan State University (2015), and Yan Xing, Chinese Art Centre, Manchester (2012). He has also participated in numerous group exhibitions, projects and biennials, including Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam; UCCA Center for Contemporary Art, Beijing; Contemporary Arts Museum Houston; Museum of Contemporary Art Taipei; Musée d’Art Contemporain du Val-de-Marne, Vitry-sur-Seine; Tromsø Kunstforening; Tampa Museum of Art; Orange County Museum of Art; Asian Art Museum, San Francisco; San Antonio Museum of Art; Today Art Museum, Beijing; Shenzhen Sculpture Biennale; and Ural Industrial Biennial, Yekaterinburg. His works have been collected by institutions and museums including M Woods, Kadist Art Foundation, M+ Museum, and the Rubell Family Collection.

Yan Xing served as a Visiting Artist in the Department of Sculpture at the Yale School of Art and the Mount Royal School of Art at the Maryland Institute College of Art, and as Christensen Visiting Artist in the Department of Art and Art History at the University of Utah. He has lectured at the Metropolitan Museum, New York, the University of the Arts Helsinki, and elsewhere.