LeUyen Pham
Pronounced Lay-Win Or Win for short.
I went to a book signing last month for LeUyen Pham and Gene Luen Yang’s book Lunar New Year Love Story. It was such a treat to sit in on their discussion. Lots of fascinating insights and behind the scenes anecdotes.
Since both of the creators are artists, I thought it would be fun to interview both of them. This is Part 1 with Leuyen. Part 2 with Gene will come out next week.
A couple of tidbits from the signing. The first, learning about how LeUyen approached coloring the book. “I based the colors on the Feng Shui wheel. There are nine segments to the wheel, each corresponding to a chapter that shares the themes of that segment of the wheel. The exception is pink, which is the first chapter, and then red is used three times, in chapters where Val’s progression towards her understanding in love advances.” What a thoughtful and cohesive way to create the art.
And the second, Leuyen did 340 pages of art, including the lettering and coloring in 7 months! I can not understate how incredibly insane this level of output is. A single penciled and inked page a day is considered fast. Forget about the lettering and coloring. LeUyen was working at a pace of more than 2 complete pages a day. INSANE.
I suppose it comes as no surprise then that she has illustrated well over 100 books. Among them are the Real Friends graphic novel series and the picture book Bear Came Along, for which she won the Caldecott medal.
Why comics?
Oh man, I ask myself that all the time. I’ve done all types of illustrations and visual storytelling, including animation, but by far, comics is the most difficult, most time consuming, and difficult to communicate. Just SO MANY DRAWINGS. But why comics then? Because there’s no other medium in which the words and the pictures hold equal weight. Because when done right, the story cannot be communicated by just the one or the other. And often times, when done right, the words and the pictures can tell contrary stories. Comics can be an intimate examination of human nature, for both the artist rendering it, and the audience reading it. There are just so few forms of story telling that allows that to happen, and that can be done by as little as one or two people. That’s why it’s worth the pain of doing it. And, man, it can be so beautiful!
What is your favorite part/step of the process?
Without a doubt, my favorite part is inking. Thumbnailing is about timing and Tetris-like planning, and if you’re off your game, you can spend an entire day jiggering a number of panels only to discover that the page turn doesn’t work. Before photoshop and Procreate, the floor of my studio would look like a paper bloodbath of panels and squares. Likewise, drawing out your thumbnails, where you have to nail the emotion, the action, and the ambience, all in a single drawing, requires all energy. But inking is the part where I get to float on all my hard work from before, turn my brain off, listen to a podcast or tv show, and just let all my well trained muscles go to work. It’s like icing for me. I just love it.
If you had a genie to promote your work in any way, what would that look like?
The genie? It would be a purple rhinoceros that could fit into a tiny lamp that I could wear around my neck. What would I get said purple rhinoceros to do for me? Is there any possible way to get off social media? I don’t like that part for sure. I keep wanting to be genuine with my work, and when I post things, I always want to spend a little time making it special and, you know, NOT a commercial. But somehow, it seems to turn into one. So I wish my purple rhino could do that for me — be my talking head in the virtual world so I can just stick to the real world. Also, a blimp would be nice.
You can find LeUyen online at:
Check Out Part 2 with Gene Luen Yang.
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