When Ruoyun Dai launched 2rt.studio, she did not set out to build just another design label or gallery collective. She created a platform that could give digital artists something they had long been denied: a path into the physical, collectible, and commercial worlds of fine art.
By Zen Fenrir
Photo Courtesy of Ruoyun Dai
When Ruoyun Dai launched 2rt.studio, she did not set out to build just another design label or gallery collective. She created a platform that could give digital artists something they had long been denied: a path into the physical, collectible, and commercial worlds of fine art.
At the center of this effort is her use of lenticular printing with up to 56 frames, a medium that has been largely overlooked by the art establishment. In Dai’s hands, it becomes a way to translate the dynamic qualities of digital work into objects that move with light and perspective. The result is not a screen or projection, but a tangible piece that can hang in a gallery or a private collection.
A vision shaped by gaps in the market
For Dai, the starting point was an observation. Digital artists had found markets through NFTs, but those markets were unstable and rarely respected by collectors of traditional fine art. Without screens or devices, there were few options to bring digital work into spaces where paintings or sculptures were expected to reside.
Lenticular printing, which layers images into shifting optical effects, offered an alternative. It gave digital artists a chance to show motion and transformation without electronics. Dai built 2rt.studio on this insight, positioning it at the crossroads of AI, lenticular technology, and contemporary exhibition design.
Exhibitions that built momentum
The studio’s debut at the San Francisco Art Fair 2025 reached more than 22,000 visitors. Dai handled every stage of the presentation, from the curatorial pitch to the booth design. She worked directly with artists such as Eli Joteva, Meltem Sahin, and Shuwan Chen, adapting their digital pieces into lenticular editions. Each transformation required precise testing and careful judgment to retain the character of the originals while giving them new physical form.
She also introduced her own Liminal Series, works that transformed hand-drawn sketches into subtle optical animations. The pieces became a focal point of the booth, drawing audiences who were eager to see how a familiar medium could shift into something alive with light and depth.
Later that year, at Art on Paper New York, Dai curated another exhibition that extended the studio’s reach to 25,000 visitors. A collaboration with Jiayue Li demonstrated how pencil drawings could be reimagined through lenticular processes. For the same fair, Dai produced her New York, New York, New York series, combining sketches, animation sequences, and AI-assisted techniques. The series was both a personal meditation on the city and a demonstration of how hybrid tools can give traditional art forms new dimensions.
Leadership through collaboration
Although Dai presents her own work through 2rt.studio, the platform is not limited to her voice. She has cultivated collaborations with international artists, including Meltem Şahin and others, who were curious to see their practice translated into lenticular form. These partnerships are built on dialogue and experimentation, with Dai acting as both creative director and technical guide.
She has also expanded the studio’s profile through partnerships with institutions and companies. With Freepik, she appeared as a panel guest and organized open calls that invited artists to experiment with lenticular media. Through :iidrr gallery and City X, she established connections with curators and collectors, ensuring that the work reached beyond experimental circles and into mainstream cultural markets.
Building infrastructure for growth
Behind the exhibitions lies a deliberate effort to create infrastructure. Dai designed the 2rt.studio website not only as a showcase but as a commercial platform. She has also been developing a SaaS service that allows artists to transform their work into lenticular formats through a set of workflows: depth-converted images, parallax layering, multi-frame animation, and stereoscopic mapping of 3D models.
This infrastructure is part of a larger plan to make lenticular art more accessible to digital creators who want to participate in physical markets. By lowering technical barriers, Dai is positioning 2rt as both an incubator and a service provider.
Redefining the status of digital art
The significance of 2rt.studio is not only in the works it produces but in the model it offers. By giving digital art physical presence, Dai has created a framework for it to be collected, displayed, and sold in ways that mirror the traditions of fine art. Her leadership has turned a marginal printing technique into a bridge between two worlds.
For the audience of collectors and curators, the appeal lies in exclusivity and permanence. For artists, it lies in the chance to see their digital experiments reintroduced as objects that can command attention in a gallery. For Dai, it represents the convergence of her skills as a designer, strategist, and artist.
What began as a response to a gap in the market has become something larger: a platform that redefines how art and technology can coexist in physical space.