Sharpbelly

11 color
Printed on coventry rag 290gsm
Deckled edges
Edition of 48

"I have been drawing in my sketchbooks and making up stories since I've have memories. I do not consider making those drawings in sketchbooks as art, to me, it’s my entertainment and it is the only chance that I can enjoy being free completely. I do not have to worry about being judged nor to have any pressure of making a “good drawing”. I just let myself go as wild as I can; also these drawings are not intended to impress anybody.

For these two images I made with Serio Press, I used my favorite method of image making, ballpoint pens on paper to create a set of two made-up folk tales based on the already well-known mythical creatures of Asian subculture. Besides that, I also recalled some elements from several traumatic experiences in my early childhood.

For the Sharpbelly, aka White Strip. When I was about 3 or 4 years old, on some occasion, I somehow discovered a postcard that had an image of a fish with a woman’s lower body lying on a beach on it. Later on, I found out that it was a painting called The Collective Invention by René Magritte. The image was painted with a realistic style, and to a 3-year-old boy in the 80s who was not exposed to all the CGI animation like the kids these days, I had no doubts that the fish woman creature existed in the real world. It was not just the disturbing look of that fish that made a huge impact on me, it was kind of sexual in a way that excited my curiosity about the mature female body as well. In my little 3-year-old brain, I started to wonder how that abused fish woman ended up there on the beach. Is she dead? What did people do to her? I think, subconsciously, I have been carrying all these questions in me about that fish woman. I kind of see it as my very first crush, and this might be the reason why I always put half woman and half fish creatures in my work though all these years, and they are all appeared sexually.

From the studio:

Serio Press is proud to welcome Brooklyn based Mu Pan into our studio to produce a pair of serigraph editions, and the artist's first screen prints. While discussing ways of adapting Pan's work to serigraphy, we sought inspiration from his sketchbooks and the ballpoint pen illustrations that fill them. 

Artist Bio:

Mu Pan was born in Taichung City, Taiwan, and initially opted for art school as a means of escaping a career in the military. He moved to the USA in 1997, obtaining his BFA and MFA at the School of Visual Arts, New York, where he now teaches illustration.

Growing up, Mu Pan was drawn to Manga, although folk art, particularly Chinese scroll paintings and Japanese prints, had a profound influence on his work. He researches Japanese, Chinese and American history, blending past events with imagined beings and occurrences to create spectacular paintings and drawings, expressions of anger, portrayals of a brutal, unforgiving world.

Mu Pan Website      |     Mu Pan Instagram