From the ‘24 class, Aline Phan was featured in last year’s AP Art gallery, showcasing her extraordinary work. She continues to work on her art within her free time when she isn’t busy with school work and college applications.
Ever since she was little and could pick up a pencil, art has been a constant throughout her life. Her spark for creating art comes naturally during her free time where she can relax and decompress. This allows for her art to remain un-rushed, done at her own pace, and authentic to herself.
She doesn’t limit herself when it comes to making art either. She does have a preference for making digital art due to the room for error whereas other media, like painting and traditional drawing, is less forgiving when it comes to mistakes; nevertheless, she still experiments with all these different mediums. Her main source of inspiration is photos that she believes would look interesting in her own style. This style, in her own words, is “realism with a touch of fantasy”.
Her latest untitled piece is inspired by Douyin, a makeup trend that started in China, named after China’s version of TikTok.
Many of her subjects consist of people from Asian descent, representing them when they are often excluded and forgotten from the art community. Often, various art subjects have only European features whereas people of color fail to be seen. Aline shows off the beauty of these subjects in her work.
Of course, she faces challenges of her own. As many other creatives face at some point, she goes through periods of art block where she cannot find motivation to draw. Another issue she faces is remaining original while using references. There is a very fine line from creating something new and just replicating it.
Aline does not see herself doing art as a career since it may take the enjoyment out of it. Rather, she wants to allow herself freedom in her work. As she leaves this year and moves into the next chapter of her life, she wants future artists at Mitty to know:
“Remember to not be so hard on yourself. You just have to trust the process even if it seems hard at first. We all start out with stick figures before we start seeing improvement. You’ll see and notice artists who are better than you but you just have to relax and go at your own pace.”
Aline will continue to work on some digital projects in the future. You can find her past work under the Arts & Comics Section, and you can follow her on her TikTok, @phanpyyu.
