by Jerry Slayton
Alt text: On the left: a photo of Lenny seated with a red shirt, short black hair and a slight smile on his face. On the right: a black and white marker drawing of a hay feild at harvest time after Harvest at La Crau created by Vincent Van Gogh.
Lenny Shang is the Art Spark Texas Artist of the Month for May!
Quite possibly the youngest artist we’ve ever featured, Lenny, currently in middle school, is a visual artist that shows ability and promise well beyond his 12 years. Last week I was able to sit down with Lenny and his mother, Cocoa, to talk about his journey in the arts thus far and get the story of how their family moved to the United States. Our brief conversation left me feeling a deeper connection to their story and Lenny’s work.
Background
Lenny was born in China, and from an early age Cocoa remembers him playing with paint. His Mother recalls, “when he was 3 Lenny loved to playing with Waterpaint during bath time. When he was 5 years old he started drawing more on paper with pencils and markers.”
She also recalled how, from an early age, Lenny used visual art as a tool for his developing communication. In kindergarten, Cocoa recounts that Lenny was delayed in his speech and so often he would use his drawings to communicate his ideas or thoughts to his teacher.
“When he went to Kindergarten, his speech was delayed so it was hard for him to talk with people and explain, so he would draw the picture to help show the picture of what he needed. He always kept drawing.”
THE MOVE TO AMERICA
In January of 2020 Lenny’s family flew to Austin to visit and look into the prospect of moving. Then, in March, when they were supposed to return home, all travel to China was cancelled. Like many, they were forced to make the best out of the pandemic restrictions, and so they began their life in Austin. Lenny finished 1st grade from home and started 2nd grade online in 2021 at Pillow Elem. Cocoa recalls that the Art teacher at Pillow Elementary took up interest in Lenny’s artwork and was a strong encouraging support for him. She expressed how those first few years were hard on the family and Lenny, but once in-person school opened back up Lenny was able to get the supports he needed and make friends. Now Lenny goes to Lamar Middle School and is attending the 6th grade.
About The Art
After discussing his background I really wanted to get to know about Lenny’s art and how he felt about what he makes. His current work is all drawing, done primarily in pen and marker, in an illustrative style. And his color palette varies wildly from a rainbow-like dreamscapes to austere black and white drawings full of texture. So I asked him about his different color styles.
“ I like both drawing in Black and White and Color. It’s fun for me to learn how to draw both, to learn how to draw the picture”
Alt text: On the left: a black and white marker drawing of a cafe at night after The Cafe Terrace created by Vincent Van Gogh. On the right: a black and white marker drawing of a hay feild at harvest time after Harvest at La Crau created by Vincent Van Gogh.
Lenny disclosed to me that he really likes to use photo references as he draws. And lately he has gotten interested in creating reproductions of famous paintings from Van Gogh and others. But with his own artistic flare. A good example is the landscape pictured above on the right. The black and white drawing is based on Van Gogh’s, “Harvest at La Crau”, a hay field during harvest. Lenny follows the masterfully layered composition beautifully, but instead of following Van Gogh’s brushstrokes for the texture of the hay he experiments with line systems to divide the land into sections. The result is a glorious collage of dots, dashes, and hatch lines that arouse the eye with information. And then, as a final cherry on top, in the sky Lenny colors a layer of bubble gum pink. THis to me was the most surprising choice, so I ask Lenny about it.
“ It’s my favorite color, it’s Pink. It reminds me of a dress, and fabric and nails. It looks so good up there.”
After that Lenny and I continued on a tangent about how great pink is, and how it seems to find it’s way into a lot of his work.
As we spoke I noticed that Lenny’s answer to my questions we usually short and to the point. That is until I asked Lenny the right kind of question. I asked Lenny to tell me the story of this picture, featured on the left, “The Little Prince”. After that, our conversation completely changed. It went from an interview that I was leading and he was providing answers to, into a journey that he was leading me through. As he told me the story his posture changed, he began to use his hands as he spoke, and elaborate details about the imaginative world of the Little Prince began to pour out of him. He was so captured by the story that it captured me, and we both walked through the story together with him narrating for around 8-10 minutes. It was great, and offered me a new insight into how Lenny thinks about his pictures.
Alt Text: A drawing from The Little Prince story. A young boy with blonde hair offers a rose to the fox standing next to him.
Spending time with Lenny and Cocoa made a mundane Thursday into a highlight. I really enjoyed them sharing their story and I. hope you all enjoy Lenny’s work. There will be much much more to come from this young man, and I know we all can’t wait to witness it. Thank again to Lenny and Cocoa.