Mei Zhao is a Chinese-born, Sydney-based multi-disciplinary artist working in painting, drawing, printmaking and installation. She grew up in Tianjin, China, and relocated to Australia as a skilled migrant in 1994. Her practice is influenced by her past, firstly as a forced farming labourer in her teenager years in China during the Cultural Revolution, and then as an immigrant in Australia. Art-making has been Zhao’s life passion from a young age. She taught herself painting and drawing to help endure the harsh farming time. She now explores her experiences of living in different landscapes through cross-cultural approaches.

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Zhao obtained a Bachelor of Fine Art in painting from the National Art School (NAS) in 2019, and completed a Master of Fine Art in painting there in 2022. Zhao has exhibited in multiple group exhibitions in Australia and was the winner of the Clyde & Co Art Award Exhibition in 2020. She is also awarded the Squatter’s Artist Residency of the Foundations at Portland and a research grant from Create NSW in 2023. Her works are held in St Vincent’s Private Hospital and private collections in Australia and the United States.

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Her two solo shows will be presented at the Dragon's Lair Gallery in the Hurstville Museum & Gallery and La Perouse Museum in Sydney later this year.  These include a body of works from her current project, cross-cultural mapping of Chinese market gardens in Sydney and regional NSW, which is supported by the Create NSW.