“I approach drawing the way I approach writing poetry. When I look at an object, I ask: am I really seeing this object, or does it feel like something else? I reimagine it, make combinations, get that "got you," "a-ha, that's it." The tools I use are a pencil, Photoshop, and Illustrator.”
Andie Z Chen lives in Shenzhen and lives alone. She creates illustrations, writes poetry and fictions. She chose painting and writing as her way of creating because she is lazy, doesn't like physical labor, and isn’t good at teamwork. She holds an MFA in Experimental Arts and Documentary Studies from Duke University. It wasn’t until she was in graduate school, that she realized she is good at writing and painting—What she had previously pursued turned out to be an illusion. It sounds like she was a failure. Her flash fiction "My First Drawing" was published by Vine Leaves Press in "50 Give or Take". She filmed a video essay in the format of her personal diary for an episode of the commercial documentary series, Thirty Three Stories. Looking back now, she thinks what a terrible script she wrote then.
