One piece from Chen's  Red and Black series which was showcased at a landmark department store in Milan, Italy, in January. [Photo provided to China Daily]

"I used to read her stories every night before sleep, but she always asked for more," recalls Chen. "So I decided to create my own stories using matchstick men to share with my faithful little audience."

Now she has been telling her magical stories for more than 13 years. Matchstick men, with the name "Ant", became her specialty and from which developed her present painting style. However, she hit a bottleneck in her sophomore year of college when a professor highlighted the imbalance between the finely-drawn clothes and the crude limbs of her figures. Entangled but impelled, she started her exploration in different ways of representation and materials, developing a keen interest in acrylic ink.

Her works have a strong oriental style, although the ink she often uses has not been traditionally used in Chinese art. "I love witnessing cultural collisions, and want to combine Chinese and Western elements that are sometimes conflicting. Such contrasts often give me surprising results," she says.