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Every month, in no particular order, this page will highlight one of the many artists who has contributed to the production and success of House of Chai productions. I’d love to include a page of links to all of the artists I admire, or even to just the ones I know and respect. But if I did, it would require a webpage that would scroll as much as the Torah!


 

House of Chai - Featured artist of the month
April 2008 - Tien-Hsin Lee

 


Shrunkenheadman Picnic. Sevvanthie Steffel screen left, Tien-Hsin Lee right.

The House of Chai artist of this month goes to my friend and fellow vegetarian, Tien-Hsin Lee. I don’t understand much Mandarin, but from what I remember, Tien-Hsin means “happy every day”. Although I’m sure she wouldn’t claim to be happy everyday, I’d feel pretty confident that the folks with her would say they were when she would be with them.


I was fortunate to meet Tien-Hsin in college and really glad to have had the chance to work with her. I spent many hours animating at the table in front of her, and would find solace amidst all of the animation by taking a break and sliding back around to her table to see what she was doing.


Tien's homage to My Neighbor Totoro. Danny Lee as Totoro, me as Mei.

Tien has helped with and given advice on most of the projects I’ve worked on in college and after graduating. One of my favorite memories is when she was helping with animation on the first version of Flames of Passion. Tien had been assigned the task of resolving the timing and motion of the main character’s flaming “xiǎo dìdì” as he jumped into the screen to meet the female character.


This quiet, young lady walked into our work area one evening and asked if we could check out a pencil test in the next room. She unassumingly hit the button on the Video Lunchbox and BOIINNNNGGGG… we all burst into laughter and walked away… happy everyday!

Unfortunately for us, Tien moved back to Taipei after graduating, so we’ve had to keep track of her electronically over the years. Since then, she’s worked on a variety of book and illustration projects, and is the proud foster mother of seven cats, one dog and a three hamsters on nintendo DS.



It’s for these reasons the House of Chai holds its cat food bowls high in honor of Tien-Hsin Lee. Shi shi my mei mei! Whoa pigu tong from animating too much!

please check out more of Tien’s work by clicking here