http://www.drawger.com/yuko/ Thu, 12 Jan 2012 13:57:16 EST FeedCreator 1.7.2 http://drawger.com/_images/drawger_leo_logo.gif http://www.drawger.com/yuko http://www.drawger.com/yuko/index.php?section=articles&article_id=13020


]]> Thu, 12 Jan 2012 18:57:16 EST http://www.drawger.com/yuko/index.php?section=articles&article_id=12950


Have a very Merry Christmas, happy Chanukah, and whatever religious or non religious holiday you are celebrating. And, a happy new year. See you again in 2012, everyone. PS: This illustration was originally created for The Atlantic Magazine's Gallery section, published in the middle of the horrible winter last year.



]]> Thu, 22 Dec 2011 18:54:31 EST http://www.drawger.com/yuko/index.php?section=articles&article_id=12889 It's December. This is the time of the year when I look back and give the light of the day to the sadly killed jobs for one reason or another. Yap. This year, it happened in January, and I knew immediately that it was going to be my "killed job of the year" My first TIME Magazine cover that never was. Yap. When TIME called and asked me to do an illustration, that, by itself, I was really excited. I have worked with TIME in past, but not so often, so phone call from them is always exciting. I think the good thing was that when they initially said 'half a page or full page" later turned into "maybe possibly cover", then "maybe possibly a cover and interior illo", I didn't take it too seriously. Oh of course, I did take the job very seriously. But I have worked long enough to know not to keep my hopes too high when I hear something that sounds just too good to be true. (Although, I know Tim and Edel and a few others here on Drawger have done multiple TIME covers in past. For me, it is still a dream. And I am in peace with it. ) When eventually, the magazine has decided to go with a photo for the cover, I wasn't surprised. The photo felt more like TIME to me anyway. It was a bit sad when eventually neither of my illustrations got published. But hey, the one with the tiger and piano got accepted into both American Illustration and Society of Illustrators annual, and then published in my first monograph (I will talk about this book some other time). I cannot ask for more. Thank you Andree Kahlmorgan and Emily Crawford for giving me an opportunity to work on an image that I am really proud of.





I found the image on the right on TIME website. Works so much better in photo than illustration, I think.



PS: Comments welcomed. But do not write things like "illos are better than photos" kind of stuff, please. Thanks!

]]> Thu, 01 Dec 2011 22:58:08 EST http://www.drawger.com/yuko/index.php?section=articles&article_id=12632 Tomorrow evening at The Visual Arts Gallery is an opening for a show The Influentials. It is a show of SVA female alumni and their mentors showing works together side by side. I don't know how I got to invited to be in this show of mainly fine artists, many of them very established, but anyway, I will be showing, together with Thomas Woodruff, who was my undergraduate illustration instructor, then grad school personal advisor, and currently my boss/chair at BFA Illustration program where I have been teaching since 2003. I wasn't sure what to show at first. I wanted to show something I hadn't shown anywhere, which, in process, is not illustration. When last severely cold winter was getting started, University of the Arts kindly invited me to participate in the Von Hess Artist Residency, to create a limited edition multi separation offset print with the master printer Amanda D'Amico. Since the print got finished, I was looking for an opportunity to show. So, this will be what I will be showing. Without Amanda's literary 'master' skill, I would have never be able to make this 6 color separation prints. Although the original image was created last year for Blowup show at the Society of Illustrators, this new version is nothing like digital print outs. Opening reception is tomorrow. (invite on the bottom of this post). If you have time, or if you are already planning on opening hopping at Chelsea's new gallery season, please schedule a stop at The Visual Arts Gallery. Big thank you to everyone at the gallery, everyone at UArts, especially Matt and Amanda, and Thomas Woodruff.



























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]]> Wed, 31 Aug 2011 16:54:20 EST http://www.drawger.com/yuko/index.php?section=articles&article_id=12531 "how do you find time to work on your personal work?" I get asked this a lot from students. I don't, and I don't. I know, this is probably not the answer aspiring illustrators want to hear. One of the reasons is that luckily, there are enough clients who call me for what I naturally do well, so I have enough jobs where there is a lot of freedom. And another, and more important reason is, because I want to try out different things. Essentially, I am doing personal work, personal experiment, but it does not need to come out as 'illustrations I do for myself'. One of the example is creating my own living environment. I had worked on this for last year and half, putting in as much effort, research, work and passion as I do to my illustrations. Trust me, I used the same idea I use for illustrations: There are compositions, rhythm, color scheme, positive and negative spaces, dense and sparce.... Today, New York Magazine's interior blog SPECE OF THE WEEK featured this big personal work of mine. When you have a moment, please take a look...



When I moved to New York in the summer of 1999 with a student visa, I had no money other than savings from my previous corporate job, which I needed to live off for the next four years in school. I bought all my basic furniture from a guy who was moving out of a room I was moving into. I ended up schlepping the furniture around for next ten years, to various apartments all over New York City. A year and half ago, I finally decided I will move to a "permanent address", and start everything  over again from scratch. When I moved to my current apartment, I asked my moving truck to stop by to the Salvation Army, and dropped off almost all my furniture off. (except my red  Barcelona chair which I treated myself with after I finished a painfully torturous advertising job a few years back). I didn't even have a mattress, and had to sleep on an ottoman bed in the living room for the first few month. Then I slowly build the apartment to where I really wanted to be. I am really excited my favorite magazine thought it was worthwhile featuring about. Big thank you to Wendy Goodman and Leonor Mamanna of New York Magaizne, and everyone who had helped me to make the apartment the way it looks now.



The apartment is stil work in progress. The couch took a year and half of back and forth between Spruce Austin down in Texas. It finally arrived just a few weeks ago. (I had a 'couch arrival party').





Many of the decorating items are bought from etsy, some from ebay, and some are purchased during my many travels to many cities mostly during school visits. I try not to forget to stop by to local antique stores and flea markets.  Apartment is actually still in progress. The last photo was taken this morning. A friend gave me a beautiful baby rose bouquet for my birthday, and somehow it just turned itself into a perfect dry flower. So, I decided to decorate my vintage birdcage with the roses. Looks eery cool. Well, at least, that's what I think!



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