SIM Chia Huey

Illustration

En Route !

En Route ! 

Let’s Go! in french

Fineliner Pens, Watercolor

2016

« En Route ! » depicts my state of mind when I was lost in uncertainty.

It all began when I resigned from my last day job to get back into arts. After a few moves, things got harder than I thought. Which made me wander between going back to my comfort zone or pursuing my dreams.

2014, my famous day job

MY EXPLORATION

It’s All About Choices

Since I’ve decided to be more active in my career, I’ve seen more and more choices popping up. Between my worries, frustration, and the uncertainty of the future, choice making becomes more and more complicated, and me, more and more hesitant.

Using Creation As Therapy

While taking a closer look into all this tension, I saw paths and roads in my chaos.

I then lay them on paper, imagining my worries, guesses, doubts and fears into a nicer drawing.

2017, as a graphic designer

MY ILLUSTRATION

"We Choose A Path, With No Clue Where It Will Take Us To."

My path began green and twisted, adventurous and fantastic. I was exploring Life. And even when this path was being all over the place, I didn’t go back. But here I am in front of my first intersection.

"The Intersection That Weighs Heavily On Me."

When you have to make a hard decision, you usually have 2 choices. Going back to the comfort zone, or taking the risk. At least this is what I believe.

So if I go the way back to my comfort zone, a pinky path that looks like happiness, I would just go back home, and back to the beginning.

But if I choose to take the risks, the bright yellow path, whether I go back to my starting point (blue waterfall), whether I be able to keep going because it’d have been the right choice (yellow pastel shade path), whether this path would make me walk upside down and I’d fall on my own backside but at least life would have given me one valuable lesson (green path and pink scarf), whether it’d be a whirlwind of ups and downs (multicolored path and violent waterfall), whether I end up standing at the edge of a cliff and….

The Obstacles’ Power To Influence

GO !

At my starting point, there’s the sales’ force Factory. Sales was the day job I quit, and that I don’t intend going back.

"It’s a way back that’s going nowhere."

THE BAIT

A little further there’s a Radio, there to lure me back to my comfort zone, revolving around and getting through a Candle, symbol of time and opportunities expending. This path goes up to a nice walk through golden grass. Unfortunately, it’s a way back that’s going nowhere. All it does is taking me along the wall that isolates me from the field, the one at the entrance of my parents’ residential area.

"When you have to make a hard decision, you usually have 2 choices."

JUDGEMENT, MONEY, EGO… MY PET PEEVES

On the other side, there’s the Eye, it judges me when I’m receiving a lesson from life, making me feel embarrassed and intimidated.

And the Cash floating in the air, who deceives, blinds and obsesses me. An obsession that leads me down to the path of nonsense.

At last, my frustration. It inflates my ego, making it plant some Poo Flag anywhere. To prove what? Nothing.

"An obsession that leads me down to the path of nonsense."

Blue Sky And Green Earth, A Comforting Environment

You might have noticed the sky in my illustration is red, while the ground is turquoise like the sea, or maybe not given that dark shade of the color.

"That’s an unstable and terrifying environment."

THE HEAVY AIR

Red is passion. An intense passion that wears me off, killing me slowly.

AN AMBIGUOUS GROUND

It is solid ground and liquid sea at the same time. If I step outside of the paths, I would be on a ground that I wouldn’t understand.

Exploring The Courage In Me To Keep Going On

The older I get and the more uncertainty frightens me. Though I know that each path has its advantage and difficulties, that the road everybody might urge me to take isn’t always the best, yet I can’t stop doubts from wasting me away. To overcome this, I look for the courage within myself, by learning my fears and doubts.

 

And even though I don’t understand my life, but since I’m already here, « En Route !», for better or for worse.

Work Exhibited at_

Exhibition “A Message from the Horizon” at TAICHUNG CITY SEAPORT ART CENTER (Taichung), from 09.09 to 01.10.2017.

Exhibition “A Message from the Horizon” at Keller Studio cultural space (Taichung), from 02.10 to 01.11.2017.

Exhibition “A Message from the Horizon” at Keller Studio cultural space