Section 1:  Background

[the following is an excerpt from Daily Record, Rob Seman, 3/30/2004]

Jean's family moved to Parsippany from his native Taiwan when he was three years old in 1981, after his father, Ben, was transferred by his job at Formosa Plastics Corp. to the company's Livingston office.

Joe Bernabe, band director at Parsippany High School, remembered Jean as a talented trumpet player and pianist whose drawings were well known around school.

"He always did all sorts of bizarre, strange pictures," Bernabe said. "Always really technologically advanced cartoon characters."

Steve Conte, owner of Funnybooks, remembered Jean as an almost-weekly customer who entered some of the store's art contests.

"He was one of those customers who has very particular tastes on comics and was only going to buy specific comics based on the artwork," Conte said.

Jean would buy anything drawn by Jim Lee, whose sleek, detailed style set the standard for superhero comics in the 1990s, Conte said. Lee's style was reflected in Jean's own artwork.

"I'm amazed at how much his style has changed then and now," Conte said. "He's developed into his own style from something pretty common that everyone was doing into his own thing."

Jean's love of comics began at age 13, when he bought issue 37 of Marvel Comics' "Wolverine," from a friend.

Since college, his comic interest hasn't changed, but the comics have. Departing from the standard superhero fare and artistic style of Jim Lee, Jean began reading small-press and alternative comics, such as "Jimmy Corrigan, the Smartest Kid on Earth."

Jean is now part of what he calls "a loose collective of cartoonists," who met in college and self-publish an anthology of short comic stories called Meathaus (pronounced meat-house).

Despite his love of drawing and comics, no one expected Jean to pursue an art career.

Ben Jean said he expected his son, who received an almost perfect score on his SAT's to go to an Ivy League school, possibly into a business or medicine, but supported his son's decision to become an artist.

"We are very proud of him because he did something he liked," Ben Jean said.

"I was a good boy who got good grades and shocked everyone when I said I wanted to apply to art school," Jean said.

He attended the School of Visual Arts in Manhattan for four years, where he received a bachelor of fine arts, after a friend in high school urged him to become a cartooning major.

Jean said his interests in college quickly shifted from cartooning to fine art, and he became a painter and illustrator.

After college, Jean said he traveled to Asia and Europe. From 2000-01, he did Flash animation for a children's educational Web site on Wall Street.

"It was good experience because I started supporting myself from my art which made my parents happy," Jean said.

But he quit the company and began shopping around his portfolio, with little success.

"Nothing really hit because I think my work was a little too strange for a lot of art directors," Jean said.

That was until Jean said he dropped his business card at the Manhattan offices of DC Comics. Soon thereafter, he received a call from Vertigo, DC's more adult-themed imprint, to paint covers for its upcoming comic "Fables," a mature, dark twist on fairy tale characters such as Snow White and the Big Bad Wolf.

The company then asked him to produce covers for "Batgirl."

"It's been a really good experience," Jean said. "It's a really good industry to work in. There is a lot of money in it that a lot of people don't realize."

The comic book work represented a change of both pace and ideas for Jean, whose non-comic work includes surreal paintings and drawings.

"I hadn't really drawn superheroes since I was 17," Jean said. "So I think it was a challenge for me to make it exciting and not just acceptable for the medium but interesting at the same time."

[end material from Daily Record, Rob Seman, 3/30/2004]

Your family expected you might go into business or medicine, had you always intended to make your living as an artist?  (v)

There aren't any artists in my family, so naturally art was a dubious career choice. But that fact that I can make a living as an artist is merely a nice consequence of the fact that I have to be an artist.

What are you all about? How long have you been doing this art thing? (ii)

I've been drawing since I can remember. Motivation came from the praise I received my first grade teacher as she paraded me across the hall to second grade to show off a drawing of an airplane I did in crayon. I thought I was so clever about the perspective of the wing on the other side of the plane.*sigh* I think my grasp of perspective is about the same now as it was it then, thanks to art school. Now, motivation comes from something much more primal--hunger. I was going to say girls, but being an illustrator, I find that I think about food now more than girls.

[the following is an excerpt from a comicartfans interview by Jason Versaggi, 11/2005]

So how old were you when you started drawing? 

I always drew and never stopped. I don't come from an artistic family, but it seems I was always pretty much self motivated to create.

When did you know this was something you wanted to pursue when you "grew up" and were your talents encouraged by your family and friends? 

Encouragement always existed in the form of adulation -- flattery can be a great motivation, but it's shallow. My parents never really wanted me to make art my life's work. It’s difficult growing up in a cultural vacuum.

So your parents worried you'd succumb to starving artist syndrome?

Yes!

Did you read comics growing up? Any favorites?

I was first introduced to comics in the 6th grade. . I believe the first comic I owned was Wolverine 45.

Soon after, I started buying X-Men, but my paltry allowance didn't allow me to have a huge 'pull' list.

Actually, I helped my dad deliver newspapers to support my comic habit. We would wake up at 5 am -- I would bag the papers in the back of the car, and my dad would throw them out the window. $5 each time I helped out, which was maybe 3 or 4 times a week

[end comicartfans interview excerpt]