Aaron Deng: Interview on Sound, Motion and Digital Identity

Aaron Deng is a multi-disciplinary artist focusing on the gap between digital design, motion graphics and synchronized audio-visual experiences. In this interview, Deng illuminates the analog and digital conflation in his independent project DICTE, the possibilities of immersion within graphic design, and the experience he had working on ‘Pop Girl’ for Lexie Liu.

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Your independent project, DICTE, uses visual and audio sensations to explore the naturalistic elements Earth, Water, Fire and Wind. What draws you to traverse and conflate the digital and natural within your independent projects?

I was really interested in how audio behaves differently in analog and digital media,  which led me to experiment with sound-driven visuals. I became drawn to interactive design quite early on, and TouchDesigner was a starting point for that exploration. 

In college, I took a class called Device Art, where I built a small interactive device using Arduino and an ultrasonic sensor—when someone moved closer, the audio and generative visuals would respond in real time. That project was a small experiment, but it introduced me to considering visuals as something that can react to sound and movement. 

DICTE by Aaron Deng. © Aaron Deng

​DICTE by Aaron Deng. © Aaron Deng

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How much of your work is concerned with immersion – this idea of creating environments and experiences for your viewer through your creative direction?

Yes—through collaborating with different kinds of people and across different contexts, I’ve been exploring how immersion can be constructed in different ways.  In formats like music videos or live shows, it’s very direct because visuals are part of the performance. They have to work together with lighting,  production design, styling, and even the performers themselves, all supporting one another to create a cohesive environment and experience. 

Pop Girl - Lexie Liu Music Video. Director: Aaron Deng. © Aaron Deng

In a constrained context, such as graphic design, the approach varies.  Since there isn’t a physical space in the same sense, immersion comes more from building a visual language - through typography, color, imagery, and layout systems - allowing these elements to extend across different formats. When they appear across posters, packaging, motion, or digital platforms, they begin to form a coherent atmosphere rather than isolated design pieces. For me, that’s another way immersion can exist within graphic design. 

Caroline Polachek, DESIRE, I WANT TO TURN INTO YOU. Vinyl Package Design with Studio Pending. © Aaron Deng

​Caroline Polachek, DESIRE, I WANT TO TURN INTO YOU 2025 Calendar design with Studio Pending © Aaron Deng

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Many of your projects stem from a wider variety of collaborations with artists, commercial brands, and fashion designers. How important has it been to work with such a diverse range of clients? What inspiration have you gained from them?

I really enjoy collaborating with creatives. Every industry has different needs, which means the emphasis in visual work also shifts accordingly. Through these diverse collaborations, I’ve learned to understand and adapt to different priorities while still maintaining my own artistic voice. 

I also like moving between different contexts. That sense of transition keeps me sensitive and curious, and prevents me from getting stuck in a single, fixed mode of expression. 

Designs for AA CLUB, active wear brand by Aaron Deng. © Aaron Deng

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Your artistic direction for Lexie Liu’s music video ‘Pop Girl’ further thrust your career last year. The video explores the contemporary necessity of perfectionism in the digital age. What drew you to incorporating these ideas into the video’s design and narrative?

The idea for ‘Pop Girl’ started from a simple observation. Today, our self-image is shaped and amplified through screens and social media, where  “perfection” often becomes something constantly pursued and performed. I  was interested in how identity can almost become a kind of product in that environment. 

In the video, we approached ‘Pop Girl’ like a manufactured icon—something polished, staged, presented and consumed. Visually, we leaned into that idea through a very glossy, almost commercial atmosphere, with stage-like spaces and highly controlled imagery. It looks very perfect on the surface, but there’s also an artificial quality to it. That tension between perfection and unreality reflects how digital culture constructs idealized identities today. 

Pop Girl - Lexie Liu Music Video. Director: Aaron Deng. © Aaron Deng

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Your career began largely operating within Shanghai’s music and fashion video scene before your later move to New York. What differences have you noticed between these two cosmopolitan spaces in terms of their artistic sensibilities?

I think Shanghai has been developing incredibly quickly. In recent years, market demand has grown rapidly. For creatives, it’s a friendly environment due to the commercial opportunities.  New brands and platforms keep emerging, and visual work can extend into many different areas of the market—such as designer brands, lifestyle stores, advertising,  and so on—constantly creating new visual needs. 

New York, on the other hand, feels like a place where many industries are quite mature and have a longer history of development. The structures of collaboration across different fields are more established, and projects often have clearer role divisions. At the same time, because people from all over the world work here, the creative environment is very diverse. 

But at the same time, I also feel that many of these differences are gradually becoming smaller. Today, almost everyone in the world is communicating within the same online space. Contents and creative work are constantly being shared and reposted across different platforms. As visibility increases, the boundaries between cities—and even between industries—are becoming less distinct.

Lexie Liu THE HAPPY STAR Album Package Design. © Aaron Deng

Pop Girl - Lexie Liu Music Video. Director: Aaron Deng. © Aaron Deng

Designs for AA CLUB, active wear brand by Aaron Deng. © Aaron Deng

Designs for GONE GOLD by Lexie Liu. © Aaron Deng