Sketch No.34 Print

I have been fascinated by storefronts ever since I set my tiny baby eyes on one. The text fonts and graphic signs, the products, the colors, the characters, logos, language, culture and so on. I want to call store fronts a portraiture of someones product. I may not always want the product, but the storefront sets a precedence for me to be interested in it. It's kind of like falling in love at first glance, but keeping the mystery present by crafting it into an art work. This piece was created when I had returned to Hong Kong with plans to stay. I was working at a gallery at this time, and I was unsure where my life was headed at this point. This illustration was of a hardware store located in Central, Hong Kong, and it was a place that I had frequented while I was working as an intern at a gallery. Ever since then I had worked as a cashier/ server at a Korean take away store, and then I worked for one week as an intern butler at the Conrad Hong Kong. I don't work at any of these places any more, but this illustration reminds me of a time right before the protests in Hong Kong started to hit. It was an interesting time for me, and I was trying to start afresh myself. This hardware store was where we bought all or most of our materials to set up the gallery. There was a lot of DIY work involved, and it was not easy, but the experience was something that I will not forget. It was a necessary step for me to get to where I am today.