The accidental artist: meet Hong Kong's Jonathan Jay Lee
Lee is one of the most in-demand illustrators in the city, yet if his parents had had their way he would never have picked up brush or pencil
Jonathan Jay Lee wasn't supposed to be an artist. "My parents are very traditional Chinese and to a certain extent there's still that stigma attached to being an artist," says the 30-year-old Taiwanese-American illustrator, whose instantly recognisable, realistic but somehow hyper-real style is suddenly on everything from comics to gallery walls to car showrooms to trainers. High art rendered in the style of mass culture, it bears the influence of everything from Western comics to manga to fashion illustration.
Born in the midwestern US state of Ohio and raised in Utah and Hong Kong, Lee only started drawing because his older brother did - and because he felt it was the only thing he was better at than his high-achieving sibling, now head of science at an international school in Tokyo. Given the reservations of his academic parents, Lee indulged his love of art privately, and when he decided to apply to art school he did so secretly. Fortunately, he received vindication in the form of a coveted place at New York's Parsons School of Design.
"Secretly, what I always wanted to do was art," he says. "There were a few people who encouraged me: teachers, friends' parents. One friend's dad, who was a big businessman, told me he'd always wanted to be a grand piano player. People like that encouraged me to go all the way. And then, after I was rejected or put on waiting lists by Hong Kong universities, I got into one of the best design schools in the world. I'd been applying in secret. My mom said I had to do it, it's too good an opportunity not to take up. And because I was so determined, eventually my parents felt: 'He must know what he's doing.'"
While he was still a student, Lee enjoyed perhaps the biggest professional break imaginable for an aspiring illustrator raised on a diet of comics: a commission from the legendary Marvel. "I went to [leading global comics convention] Comic-Con. The big guys, Marvel Comics and DC Comics, hardly see anyone: you have to leave your work and see if your name appears on a list. I managed to get an appointment, then missed it, and finally got to speak to an editor after about two hours of trying.
