Chueh had made most of his paintings in that little workspace, work that's been shown in galleries, as vinyl toys, prints, even ending up on the cover of a Fall Out Boy album. His simple, character-driven images are spare, and feature bears and rabbits in angsty tableaux. "To me," Chueh explains, "these are all different paintings and each painting stands on its own. I don't look at them as a repeat character, but I'm trying to connect an iconic look that will help separate me from the sea of other character-driven artists out there."
"The reason why I use the characters that I do," he continues, "is because it was a way to sidestep potential prejudices that might come up if I painted an Asian male or a black female. Human beings generally have prejudices, whether they like it or not. If I were painting an Asian male, I'd be instantly alienating my audience. Animals kind of shift away sexism, ageism, and racism."
But that wasn't the initial impetus for him to paint them. "The reason I started using animals was because I am a self-taught painter. There was no way when I started out that I'd be able to paint something like Robert Williams or Todd Schorr or Mark Ryden. My skills were nowhere close to that level, so I started with cartoons because it was all I was able to paint."
He had plenty of company as an artist who painted animals, and began along with Gallery 1988 in Los Angeles to organize large group shows, called Vivisect. "It's of artists who use animal characters to illustrate the human condition." November 2009 sees the sixth incarnation of the show—and the last. "All good things have to come to an end," he says. Luke Chueh will have a solo show at Los Angeles' Copro Gallery in May 2010, his first without the 'shedio,' though not to worry: "I should have a new one done this week, so I'm excited to get back to work!" –by Caleb Neelon / Hurley Art
