I think anyone that's seen my art/character designs realize that there's usually a Chinese influence to them -- e.g. characters wearing cheongsam, hanfu, and so on. It's sort of a new development from recent years (2018-ish), but mostly because I started feeling more comfortable with it! This ramble has a lot to do with that, how it happened, and why I do it.
For a bit of background: I'm Chinese diaspora (2nd gen Canada-born Chinese). I grew up in a city that was probably 2% Asian at most, so I was pretty much the only Asian kid in my classes for the majority of my childhood. This means I was pretty lonely in that regard: there were very few people around me that looked like me or felt familiar to me, especially in media that I consumed. I was very drawn to characters that were more familiar to me (i.e. obviously East Asian; namely female characters with black hair).
Side ramble about said characters: Mulan is still hands down the best Disney princess, but I'd be lying if part of my attachment wasn't because she was Chinese. The gender nonconformity helped a lot, too. And, to the surprise of no one, I loved Syaoran and MeiLing from CCS for having a Chinese background/aesthetic. I also loved Sailor Mars and Kikyo (Inuyasha) for looking distinctly East Asian, though they were clearly Japanese.
Anyways, that's all to say representation is important and something rare to me growing up. I was
different and while I didn't hate it, it was a bit lonely and made me hold onto whatever I could.
Note: I did and do have friends online that were Asian, but it's not like it was something that would come up in conversation often.
A lot of the art I grew up with had more Western/European or Japanese-styled fashion, so it's what I drew a lot too! There were some slight Chinese influences, but not too much. I think the main turning point for me was in around 2018: I designed my OC
Frog's outfit for MapleStory2. The main idea was that I got the name "Frog" and wanted to make my character resemble a Frog as much as I could, and the buns were a good start. Since the buns were pretty 'Chinese' in style, I decided "maybe I can try to make a cheongsam with a Frog-theme to it," and... the design was really well received? There was a fear that people would think the design was 'weird' or something, but I got a lot of kind comments about it. It was surprising to me, but also very heartwarming!
I think that made something click for me. Even if I didn't see a lot of Chinese-styled outfits previously, especially in fantasy, I could just draw it myself. It's not like I didn't like Western/Japanese-styled fashion -- I actually like them a lot! I adore them! But being able to design characters that I wish I had seen growing up ended up being really important to me. It also made character designs click a lot faster for me, which was interesting. Characters that didn't have specific outfits for
years finally had an outfit that felt right to me.
At this point in time, I do end up seeing a lot more Chinese-influenced things than before. This is probably by virtue of it being a little more common, and because I ended up following more people with those preferences too? Either way, waking up and seeing a lot of Lunar New Years-related art and content was very... heartwarming to me. I would have
never seen so much at any point when I was growing up. So even though my family's not celebrating as much as we used to (COVID and all), I still feel happy.
(It's also not just Chinese stuff! I've seen a lot of Korean and Vietnamese LNY art too, which was just as impactful to me. I love seeing people repping their own culture -- it makes me feel more comfortable.)
I do sometimes worry that people will feel I'm obnoxious about it or feel put off by it, but I think that's their problem in the end, not mine. I had to grow up seeing a lot of European- and Japanese-inspired fashion in the media I consumed: I'll fill up the void of Chinese-inspired fashion on my own if I have to
Most of the things I draw/make is for my own self-satisfaction anyways. I don't particularly care if people like it or not -- I do what makes me happy in the end.
As an additional note: despite all of this, I don't have the ability to speak anything that my family is able to (Cantonese/Mandarin/Teochew/Vietnamese). I can understand a little bit when hearing it, but not too much. I think for 2nd/3rd/etc. generation diaspora, this is a bit more of a familiar feeling. I always feel a little bit like a fake/liar for not being able to speak/read any Chinese despite drawing it so much, but I think that's also an important part of my experience. I would love to learn one day, and have plans to once I have more time in my life. For now, though, I'll rep the Chinese diaspora that are in the same boat as me
This is a very simplified overview of stuff -- it doesn't even remotely touch a lot of topics/experiences I have as diaspora in a predominantly non-Asian community. Stereotypes, even well meaning ones, and whatnot. That's a very involved and slightly different topic from the one I wanted to ramble about here.
