Yu Xiao who lives and works in Beijing, recently won first prize in the China Academy Awards at China Central Academy of Fine Arts, where she graduated in 2009. In 2010, Yu exhibited at CAFA Museum in Beijing, China, as well as the Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts in Copenhagen, Denmark. Within Yu Xiao's work, there are nostalgia-provoking images of a childhood full of dreams. Confronted by the gap between the fretless childhood life and the pressure of grown-up society, the artist cries, "I don't want to grow up." Yu's "Never Grow Up"series is the story about her growth into adulthood and the realisation that the world is not as wonderful as her childhood allowed her to imagine. In reaction to the grown-up world around her, Yu uses her work to create a fantasy world to escape the stresses of society. Although aspects and images of her childhood appear within her work, such as dolls, teddy bears, her little red bike and the path she went to school on, they only go so far as to highlight the distance she is from her childhood and the harsh realities of the world around her.