James Jean (Taiwan, 1979) is a Los Angeles-based visual artist, known for both his commercial work and fine art gallery work. Raised in Parsippany-Troy Hills, New Jersey, he was educated at the School of Visual Arts in New York City, from which he graduated in 2001. To describe James Jean would be difficult. He has had the distinguished role of creating art through numerous fabrics of culture. Following his graduation, Jean wasted no time in making his mark through the world of comics. Holding down a role at DC Comics was a springboard to being the visual lead behind Bill Willingham’s well-received Fables series.
Throughout his comic book career, Jean has been on the receiving end of countless Eisner Awards, celebrating the very best in the comic book industry. Yet his scope and influence has extended far beyond that into the realm of popular culture with high-profile clients representing a veritable who’s who of publications and brands such as Prada, Philip Lim, The New York Times, Rolling Stone, Spin, ESPN, Atlantic Records, Target and Playboy. Despite all this success through illustration, it was never the plan for Jean. The goal of becoming a painter was unfortunately side-tracked as illustrating became a powerful and lucrative draw since 2008, when Jean retired from illustration and commercial projects in order to focus on painting. “I’ve wanted to be a painter since I was 20, but to survive, I found work as an illustrator. My identity was obscured in the commercial success I found in my 20s. Now I’m trying to establish myself as the artist I intended to be”.
Now, many fans of from the comic period are having trouble accepting Jean’s abandonment of the pen in favor of the paintbrush. As James states, “Generally an illustrator is concerned with the creation of a picture, while a painter questions the nature of a picture. The latter approach tends to lead to something more open-ended and transgressive, raising more questions than answers. If my new work doesn’t alienate the fans of the illustration and comic book work, then I’m doing something wrong. But I hope those fans can grow with me as my work evolves.” He lives and works in Los Angeles, where he shares a studio with his partner David Choe.
