Last updated on December 21st, 2021
Life isn’t about finding yourself, it’s about creating yourself. This perfectly describes the making of an artist who has given a fabulous path to her passion and nourished it like a flower. Being an artist series presents the journey of a woman, a mother, and an artist who found her artistic abilities from her daily routines and tuned it to her profession perfectly. PrintShop by Designhill admires such artists and feels pleasure to provide a platform to live their artistic dreams. Meet Jenny Liau from Malaysia.
Jenny is a lovely mom and wife who started her career two years ago when she attended a modern calligraphy workshop in her town – Sabah, a state in Malaysia. Thereafter, she decided to give a hand on creating beautiful lettering by using a brush pen.
After some time, she even took an online course to learn more about calligraphy and lettering. Today, she is one of the aspiring artists on Printshop where she has been creating, showcasing, and selling her marvelous works to the millions of audiences.
PrintShop is a print-on-demand marketplace where anyone can discover & buy 50+ unique products, gifts & artwork created by 150+ artists from more than 180 countries around the world.
It’s an online marketplace where 100+ new artworks are uploaded every minute to provide the new shopping vibes for customers.
Asking About Her Artistic Journey And Her Love For Calligraphy, She Says:
“I’m a mother of one little girl and a wife to an amazing man. I’m a baker by day who gets all kinds of orders such as birthdays, anniversaries, and wedding cakes. Honestly, I’m in love with lettering and doodle and I’m always thinking about cakes and coffee. I’m a self-taught calligrapher and letterer who is still learning and will never stop learning. And, I’ve always loved designing but not given the opportunity to study until recently with more resources online. I started calligraphy two years ago when there was a modern calligraphy workshop going in my town Sabah (Malaysia) using an oblique pen. However, I stopped for a while after that because I found it troublesome to practice it daily by setting up the ink with a toddler beside me. 7 months ago, I tried again with a brush pen and I’ve not stopped since then. Using a brush pen is so much more convenient and practice as I can just take a brush pen and put it in my bag and practice it wherever I go when I have the time. I realize that along the journey as there are tons of things to learn in the art field. It can be calligraphy to lettering, to doodle to painting, and many more. Today, I have been selling my artwork on PrintShop and gaining a lot of recognition for the same. Earlier, it was just a hobby of creating beautiful lettering for my cake customers, and today, it has turned out to be my career. I feel blessed.”
PrintShop: What’s your process of creating a piece of artwork and what tools and techniques do you use?
Jenny: To create a presentable piece takes a lot of time. With that, I have a whole new level of respect for artists. They do a tremendous job. I start with sketching it on a piece of paper with a pencil then I’ll finalize it with a pentel touch brush pen or zebra mildliner or Tombow. In digital, I use Procreate all the time.
PrintShop: How do you find inspiration and stay creative?
Jenny: I normally find inspiration from Instagram and Pinterest. If I’m not with my phone, I’ll get inspiration from everywhere, for example, the garden, nature, supermarket, my daughter’s book, etc.
Staying creative is not as easy as I thought because nothing is new under the sun. What I thought was my original idea was someone else’s idea a long long time ago. To stay creative, I get to upgrade myself in skillshare and YouTube.
PrintShop: Did you face any challenges in your artistic journey? If yes, How did you overcome it?
Jenny: I think the challenge is everywhere, not only in the artistic journey but in everyone’s lives. We face all kinds of challenges in life.
So with that, I take a break from it and get myself away from social media a bit so I don’t have to meet up with the unseen expectation that people build up in me or I’ve built it up for myself.
After some break, I always come back refreshed. There’s a saying like this, if you get tired, learn to rest, not quit.
PrintShop: What is the best advice you’ve gotten as an artist or the most important thing you’ve learned?
Jenny: I think the best advice is don’t compare yourself with others. Even though you have the same idea or concept but the outcome is always different as we are all unique human beings created by an amazingly creative God. Don’t compare your 1-year-old journey with someone who has already worked for 5 years.
Ian Barnard said, the difference between you and someone you admire, is just a matter of time and practice. So I believe that the more you practice, the more progress you’ll make.
Check out her latest work on PrintShop
