JEREMY LEUNG
The Chinese Canadian illustrator channels his feelings of leaving Christianity into his comic, From Dust to Dust.
My parents immigrated from Hong Kong to Canada in their teen years. They naturally gravitated to a community with a shared language, and the church was there for them. So when they raised me, they wanted that for me as well.
I think as I was getting older, I realized I just didn't identify with that community and I wanted to find my own path towards spirituality. But leaving Christianity behind was really, really difficult, so art was one way to have the confidence to do that.
Drawing was one of the few things that I knew I had talent in. I was insistent that that would be my career from the start and in college, I studied editorial illustrations, so the path was pretty laid out for me. And I just stuck with it.
I did diverge into other fields, specifically graphic and UX [user experience] design for a few years after college, but I came back to drawing and how it ties to my upbringing. I think it was the only way I could really express how I felt at that time and sometimes how I feel even now. It's the one art form that feels true and I can use my hands to create what I'm trying to say. There's sort of these intangible feelings that I experience from the past, and my work has this sort of energy to it.
“But I feel relief when I make something new. I only get that feeling when I draw.”
Sometimes it can be dark. Sometimes it can be bright. But I feel relief when I make something new. I only get that feeling when I draw.
***
I took a zine-making and risograph course at the School of Visual Arts in New York City in 2019. The goal of From Dust to Dust was to create an original story and use their printing resources to create the product. I was trying to find a way to tell my story of growing up in a religious background and leaving that behind in my mid-twenties. I was also really interested in monster analogies and bright colors and particularly influenced by the anime Evangelion. I tried tying all of these influences together, but focusing on the writing was my main goal for that project.
The comic is 24 pages long and I went through several iterations with risograph. You can really mix different colors together and, depending on the palette you choose, it can take more time or less time. So actually, the original draft was a teal and pink color palette.
I switched it to blue and red instead of blue, red, and pink because I thought the impact would be there. I think the story was how my personal demons and personal choice to leave a dogma and a set of beliefs behind felt very scary at the time. I wanted to kind of anthropomorphize that feeling, so it was written in the first person.
From Dust to Dust
I think illustration has a very powerful effect where you can exaggerate those feelings and turn them into visuals. Photography and design, to me, feel more strict, so that's why I love to draw because I can really express myself in those ways.
I want to convey this sense of wonder and curiosity and depth. I also want my work to always have lots of detail and intricacy. My peers have always said that I have such a complicated style that's not like some other folks who can draw very simplified figures, colors, and shapes. For better or worse, I just have a very complex approach because I think my mind and thought process are complex, so it’s reflected in what I draw.
“I think illustration has a very powerful effect where you can exaggerate those feelings and turn them into visuals.”
***
I think I had a lot more work come in once I moved to New York. It's not necessarily that the clients knew that I was based in New York, but I think the motivation kind of propelled my style forward and slowly made my artistic voice clearer to clients. It's just the energy — the shared motivation — that allowed me to discover that voice. So location definitely makes a huge difference, and I'm actually in a place now where I'm trying to move away from editorial.
I'm feeling some burnout, actually. It's not just that I'm moving apartments, but I'm also moving, I think, a lot in my life. This feels like a year where a lot of things are gonna change for me.
I love New York. I've always wanted to live here. I think being mature enough to really handle the stress of it was important, so I'm glad I moved when I did when I was 27. There's a lot of other illustrators and artists here that inspire me, so that was my main reason for coming and staying as long as I have. And I'm planning to stay longer if I can. I think there's just this mutual understanding that we all are trying to be the best version of ourselves in New York, and I don't feel that as strongly in other cities.
***
I think anxiety and mental health issues — those are all really prevalent in a lot of my friends' lives and in my own life too. So I'm just navigating that. Sometimes, it honestly gets to a point where I don't want to draw because I struggle with accepting that it may not look good or I don't have a client telling me these parameters. It's a struggle sometimes just to make art for the sake of making it.
Cave
The idea of the lone artist working alone in their studio, to me, is actually not that ideal. When I’m left with my own thoughts, I will just not take as many risks. I'll retreat to what I know, which is doing client work repeatedly. In order to experiment, I personally need friends to push me and I can push them as well.
I'm into the idea of escapism through art and that art is meant to heal and connect people together spiritually, and that it can start a conversation between people. I think that's why I love New York; it's a place where so many people can constantly meet for the first time or repeatedly. And if my artwork or someone else's artwork can be the conduit for that, that's all I can ask for. Just as a conversation starter or as a way to say, “Hey, I relate to that story.”
As told to Michaela Zee
This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity. All images courtesy of Jeremy Leung.
