SEAN LEAN
THIRD TIME'S A CHARM
THREE IS A BIG NUMBER for a ist Sean Lean this year. Not only is his latest a work titled “3,” this marks his third solo exhibition (at Wei-Ling Gallery), three years a er his last showing. It wasn’t on purpose though, he mused. “3” was simply and purely about Sean’s series of triptychs that each encompasses three separate panels of strong visual commentary on political, social and religious issues.
It was back in college that Sean found his calling. While studying digital animation, he a ended a Fine A seminar where he was evidently sold on what he describes as “the dream of this romantic lifestyle as an a ist.” Reality however, was a li le trickier. WHAT IS THE EXPECTATION VERSUS REALITY ASPECT OF BEING AN ARTIST? It’s weird, I don’t know if it’s a very Malaysian thing, but every successful Malaysian a ist that I know - they live the most boring life. It’s like, the more boring your life is, the more interesting your works are. It’s like, because being an a ist you have no bosses, you kind of have to structure your own life. And being able to manifest your work physically, actually making work and not keep it in your own head, being productive; it’s a big pa of being a full time a ist. So it’s very impo ant that you structure your life accordingly so that you can be productive, that you can share your ideas by making work. So yeah, it’s very different from imagining being an a ist having a fast and loose lifestyle. YOUR WORK THROUGHOUT THE YEARS IS QUITE DIFFERENT FROM ONE ANOTHER. HOW WOULD YOU DESCRIBE YOUR EVOLUTION AS AN ARTIST? I suppose it’s different on purpose, in a sense. I am naturally quite impatient. I tend not to be able to stick to one specific way of doing things for long. So a er every body of work, I tend to try to find new things and new approaches to how I can make a . So that resulted in works that look quite different from one body to another. DO YOU FEEL UNCOMFORTABLE WHEN YOU HAVE TO GET REALLY PERSONAL IN YOUR WORK? Being an a ist is very daunting, especially if you’re honest with yourself, and you produce work that is really honest. Like, my work is about my relationship with my dad. I didn’t want people to know that. It’s very raw, it’s very real, but I felt compelled to make that piece of work. And you go through that process of kind of revealing yourself, almost like, naked to the public, like, “look at me.” I think that’s a good practice to kind of relinquish your ego, in that sense. And when you have less ego about yourself, you have more confidence.