The Comic Strip of Asian America
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artist bio |
Artist Biography |
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| Name: | Ian Liu | ||
| Nationality: | Chinese American | ||
| Favorite Ice Cream: | Pistachio Almond | ||
| Favorite Color: | Yellow of course! (Blue, actually) | ||
| Major Influences: | George Perez (DC Comics Artist, Teen Titans) Alex Ross (DC Comics & Marvel Comics Artist, JLA, X-men) Berkely Breathed (Comic Strip Artist, Bloom County) Gary Larsen (Comic Strip Artist, The Far Side) Aaron McGruder (Comic Strip Artist, The Boondocks) |
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| Role Models: | Leland Yee (California Senator) |
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Q & A |
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1. |
What made you want to start a comic strip? | ||
| I'm not sure... I just know that I wanted to do something productive in my free time. I've always liked drawing and playing with computer graphics. I suppose I just wanted to try different things. Maybe part of me has a desire to reach out to people and express my thoughts and feelings in a manner I'm comfortable with. | |||
2. |
If you're going to do a comic strip, why do one on the Asian American experience? | ||
| It's something that I know by virtue of being Asian American. Also, one of the thoughts I had growing up here was simply that there wasn't much media and content out there showing Asian Americans. It wasn't until later in life that I realized... actually, there is quite a bit of representation of Asian Americans as artists, musicians, actors, and entertainers. The problem is that we as an Asian American community aren't getting exposed to that content and getting that exposure isn't easy. As an example, there's now just one cable channel in the bay area, "AZN, The Network of Asian America" that delivers this content to the public. So, if you only have basic cable, you only see the publicly broadcasted channels which mostly show Caucasians and other ethnic representations. | |||
3. |
So, why do you think that's the case... there being a lack of Asian representation in the publicly broadcast channels? | ||
| The situation is simply because we live in a predominantly White society, most of the media networks and show biz companies caters to them. It's only natural... like the law of supply and demand. | |||
4. |
What is it that you want to achieve in doing this strip? | ||
| Being an Asian American, I know the climate that we are faced with and the bi-cultural experience that each of us has grown up with. I'm also only too familiar with the stereotypes out there which "imprison" us, so-to-speak, in terms of our perceptions by others. That's really the driving force behind why I'm doing what I'm doing. I want to eradicate these false perceptions and stereotypes and show that Asian Americans are just like all the other ethnic Americans in that we also, like them, have multi-cultural backgrounds but are also just as "American" as they are. We share the same aspirations, interests, and desires to experience life, enjoy its freedoms and all that it has to offer. Let me also say that another motivation for doing this is I want to offer something to the Asian American youth... something for them to identify with and relate to. Just as importantly, I want to express to the non-Asian American community that we, the Asian American community, are a vital and important segment of American society and that we do have a "human" side to us which is frequently not shown on television or film. For some reason I've noticed that a lot of the portrayals of Asians in America are quite stereotypical and often times rather negative and one-sided. | |||
4. |
Yes, Hollywood does seem to take full advantage of portraying minorities in America in stereotypical fashions, and as you say, rather negatively and one-sided. Why do you think that is? | ||
| It doesn't take a lot of imagination? I think there are a lot of driving forces out there... just as I have this driving force to eradicate those images.... I know I can't ever eradicate it. But, at least, I can try to make a dent in them. I'm not one to believe in conspiracy theories but I'm not one to deny that they exist either. I mean, it's a big world out there with lots of micro-cultures. Who knows why anyone does anything? Why is it that when we went to school as children, there was always a school bully? or a neighborhood delinquent? I think you get where this is going. In almost everything, there's always "some" or "many" who act irresponsibly and take pleasure in doing so. It's as simple as that. I just wish it wasn't so "mysterious" and "rampant". In fact, I wish we could highlight these individuals or groups and ask them exactly what is their agenda and motivations for skewing public perception of people and spreading progranda-like entertainment in film and television? Are they being paid by special interest groups? Who knows... Daniel Day Kim, the actor in Fox's "Lost" television series said it best about the portrayals of Asian men in America during an interview with The Korea Times: "We (Asian men) have been portrayed as inscrutable villains and asexualized kind of eunuchs." He's acknowledging the social emasculation of the Asian male by Hollywood. It's no coincidence that Hollywood is made up of at least 70% percent Caucasian males. Maybe if you had more diversity in sex and race in Hollywood, the portrayals of minorities, particularly the Asian, would improve? I'm willing to bet on that. Anyway, I couldn't have said it better than Daniel Day Kim. |
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