Local Artist Highlight: David Nguyen

Taking inspiration from Henri Toulouse-Lautrec and Dr. Suess, while engaging in his own experimentation, David Nguyen explores his life experience and spiritual journey. From Kentwood to Guam to Kendall to his own art studio, there’s plenty of material to work with. He takes on existential topics in a playful manner with colorful, anime-influenced visual expressions.

Can you tell me a little bit about where you’re from and how art became your path? I’m from Kentwood, born and raised. Right down the street from here, there’s a Biggby Coffee…I’ve actually been waiting to tell this story, because I feel like it’s my origin stuff. When I was about fifteen, I went to the Biggby with some friends, and I was drawing. One of the baristas saw what I was doing and said ‘Hey, you should hang that on the wall or something here.’ I thought that would be so cool. I was so enamored, I didn’t know how to act—I was so shy back then. I don’t think I went back there for another five years. Nowadays, I actually go there to hang out and talk to people.

I went to Kentwood schools growing up, and then I was in the Navy for some time. I didn’t really know what to do after high school. When I was ready to get out of the military, I started applying to art schools. I had always heard about Kendall growing up—my older brother had some art friends. I heard cool things from them. So, I decided I wanted to apply.  I was stationed in Guam at the time. I started drawing really studiously, instead of abstractly as I like to do. I started trying to figure out how to draw from sight and get correct proportions and shading, details and whatnot. I’ve always had a great appreciation for fine art—I’ve tried to emulate that like it’s a distinguished sort of thing. So, when I got accepted, I was really happy about that.

I was 25 when I got out of the military. I spent 5 months getting reacclimated and working at a health food store. Not too long after that, the next semester was starting up, and I felt like I could go back to school…use my GI Bill benefits. So, I went to back to school at Kendall, took some classes. After the first year, I started getting very impatient. I was 25 or 26 and my classmates were 19. I made some friends here and there, but I felt a little…not to say I was a big fish in a small pond, because I was seeing how the other students could be bigger fish too. I guess I felt that the syllabuses and assignments in class felt like a retread to me of things I had already done. I had a sculpture class where the professor gave us a bunch of cardboard and told us to just play with it. At first, I was pretty excited, but then the professor had his feet kicked up on the desk. I thought ‘Dude, I don’t know.’ That kind of set me off. I thought about how I spent four years in the military, and this is coming out of my earned income. Then, I have a professor who’s telling me to play with cardboard, which I did in elementary school. So, I ended up dropping out. There were also girls in the class, and I cared a lot more about the girls than the classes.

Is anyone else in your family artistic? My little sister just got a tattoo gun, and my mom does nails so she's always been really into detail. That may be more work than art and expression, but yeah, I'll say she's an artist. My brother and I used to always draw together growing up. I used to have a partner who was an artist, and she really inspired me a lot with my art.

When did you start making art yourself? In elementary school, I told my grandpa that I had this assignment to do. My teacher told us we were going to make this robot out of cardboard. I just lit up—I remember how cool that was. I had a vision. I wanted to go home and get all the noodle boxes and make a huge robot. So, I made this robot that was human size…life size. My grandpa helped me bring it to school. And then, my teacher said we were supposed to make that robot as a class, not just one person. I had made an entire robot by myself. I loved playing with things and making projects. I drew all throughout my lifetime. I was always copying TV shows, anime, things like that.

I wanted to go to school to better my skills, but also meet new people. I had a rebellious side. I wanted to be radical with my art, but also do it in a way that was seen as ‘He worked for that. He can do that because he has a distinguished background where he earned the abstractness.’ Because sometimes if you just play with paper, people think you don’t actually know how to do things. You know, you can appreciate things at face value, and that’s cool, but I also wanted to earn it.

How did you build your art practice? This part of the story gets pretty interesting in another way. My mental health was an issue after the military—I had trouble shifting down after that. I dropped out of Kendall and started working more at the health food store. I started noticing how I couldn’t downshift after getting out of the military. I started to freak out—seeing things…hearing things. That was pretty tough for some time—that was in 2019. My family came and really helped me out a lot—they got me in touch with the VA. We got some help. I was on disability, and I’m still on disability now. My plan is to get off of disability in not too long here. I‘ve been trying to work on making art and being healthy…well, being healthy first and then making art as an expression of being in a better place now than I was.

In 2020, I got an iPad, and that really changed up the game for me a lot. I wasn’t making too many messes. You can erase on that thing, and then print it out onto canvas when it’s done. I don’t know if this plays a role, but I’m a Pisces. I feel like I have the whole thing in my mind—like all of life. I’m really lazy, but that can also be smart.  I know how to do things that can benefit me better than exerting extra effort. But it’s a double-edged sword. So, when I got the iPad, I realized I could draw something and print it onto canvas and get a pretty good fine art effect.

Let me show you this piece—this is called Watermelon Picnic. I printed out this piece, and it was one of my first pieces. It got damaged in moving around some things where I was living. The piece had cost so much money to print out, so it kind of sucked seeing a big scratch on it.  I ended up buying oil pastels. All the colors were digitally printed on the canvas, and I painted over it with white oil pastel. I made it into a whole new piece. It was a digital piece that was printed onto canvas, and then it became traditional again. I really like the story of that. It took on a whole new cool dimension. I’ve been thinking about mistakes recently. You can acknowledge that ‘This situation is not ideal,’ but it doesn’t have to tarnish you or get deep underneath your skin. We all know no one’s perfect. You can just roll with it. You can’t change the past, of course, so what can you do to keep rolling with it? Sometimes what ends up happens is more interesting. That’s life, because you if you try to plan everything, it’s like ‘Who’s ego is running this thing?’ And you don’t want that.

What’s this piece on the floor? This is a little flying reindeer with some bats around him. I had a table here, and this is where I was making some stuff. Maybe this is a little scary, but I’m getting into shamanism. I was into it before—that may have heightened my mental health issues. But ever since I was really young, I’ve experienced some pretty interesting spiritual stuff. So, I’ve started getting into shamanism again, and thinking about how to do it in a way that is empowering rather than weird and unhealthy. Now, I’m trying to experience it in a healthy way.

What are you including in Melody’s Funkytown show? David shows me several pieces and describes how he has combined different media for each one. The work is colorful, and the combination of media add an appealing complexity. He has a piece with gummy bears that will be perfect for the show. This one is Dr. Suess-esq. I really like Dr. Suess. This one is completely digital. This was traditional first. This one was traditional and digital. Printed onto giclee print for the show. This is traditional and digital. This is a recent one—this was gouache, watercolor, colored pencil and digital. I just got some more gouache paints, which I’ve never really played with in the past. It’s kind of in between watercolor and acrylic. It’s really fun. It’s an interesting consistency. I’ll get these printed onto giclee, good paper. I’m trying out the Shinola sketch book and that’s the first page. I am figuring out the consistency of the different papers.

What else are you working on? Like I said earlier with mistakes, with this piece, I was doodling with different kinds of perspective with what I wanted to portray. Then, I decided to put some acrylic on this—I had no idea what acrylic paint was going to do to this. But then I been trying to experiment a lot more lately. Life finds a way. This, I am really proud of … that I decided to just put something on there and wipe it away.  

I have a piece that I was including for ArtPrize. One place did send a request back, but I denied it because I didn’t like what the venue stands for. I feel like a conscientious guy. Set and setting play a big role into how the art is viewed and taken in and what it can mean. It doesn’t have to, but I thought if I am going to be shown—I have to think about where I want to be shown. I’ve been working on that for a while. I used to work at Madcap downtown at one of their standing tables. They’re so cool over there. I would set up shop and order a drink and have at it. It was good times. I’ve been working on that ArtPrize piece on and off for about 5 months plus.

I'm really struck by that bird painting.  Oh yeah, that’s cool. I'm a rooster in the Chinese Zodiac, but Pisces too, like I said. So, I have both of those together in that piece. Yeah, that was fun. I made that when I had an artist residency in Port Austin. About 20 people live there, and it's really close to the water. The person who organized it was a liaison for the Detroit Institute of the Arts.

How many hours a day do you work on art—is it consistent or do you go on art binges? Definitely art binges. Everything accumulates to it. So even if I take a break for a while and work out or watch TV or go to work, it’s all going to always be there. Life experience into a funnel. And then, even the love of the art feeds my life too. It’s a nice reciprocal thing. I’ve been trying to live more life. I used to really try to make my Instagram pop off, and that was not good for me. Now I try to make more real connections and get out there more and live life. We know art is a fixed reality capture—it’s not really a living thing. It can definitely give life and all that. But when you get too focused on it, you can get way too into a reflection of life instead of experiencing life for what it actually is. I used to write too, and that’s even more so a dead language. Life is living and breathing. When you write, you’re before yourself and after yourself. As cool as the art can be, it’s diminishing of life at the same time. Life is living and breathing. But, there’s a balance.

When you show your art, if you’re there, you can talk to people about it. What about connecting with people that way through art—maybe you’re connecting with people through time? Yeah, that’s very nice, I like that. I don’t really like making artist statements though. I don’t like talking about my art generally. The visual is how it’s speaks. This is the language in which it presented itself. I don’t also want to be the interpreter. Hopefully, that’s someone else’s job. I’m just the guy who shows it right now, but I’m not actively making it right now. There’s a lot of identity and consciousness that play a role with art … so to talk about it too, I think it’s a bit headass. You bestow so much on logic. And it’s like dude, just take it in. Do you like it?

Right, if you’ve created this visual piece, why do you then need words next to it? Doesn’t that change what it is? Isn’t that the tyranny of the educated class, the literary class, the academy? They want everything translated into words. Right, if you’ve created a visual piece, it speaks that way. You see tribal art or indigenous stuff. I have some friends who are poets who say their work is indigenous. Well, I think my art is indigenous–I did go to school for a little bit, but it's really self-taught and life taught. I don’t want to propel my art at the expense of my art because I now have to play by their rules to propel it. It’s like going into someone else’s maze. I’m going to do this for the rest of my life. Personally, I don’t care if I make a lot of money off of it or whatever. It’s just my love, it’s one of my loves. I mean, I might play a little bit in that world, just because I can be a little bit headass, but I’m not going to sell out.

At the same time, too, the whole world’s getting gentrified. There’s a lot of beauty in tribal art—Amazonian tribesmen who are at the forefront of sticking up for the rivers. Sometimes, we hear about the good stuff in the world just as it’s coming into contact with gentrification. I'd rather be the indigenous person that comes out to show everyone else what’s happening—evil can be subjective. It's a hard bullet to swallow that we're going to die, but once you taste it, you might as well get it through you.  We can try to make the world a better place the best that we can, but it's not going to get better if I just stop right now and go to work. It’s not going to get better if I do that. So, you make art. Yeah, yeah, for sure.

What’s your hope for your art practice? I'm trying to get off of disability, so I can like make all my art from a cleaner slate. Dr. Seuss was in the military. JPEGMAFIA, he’s a musician now—he was in the military. A lot of people are in the military. It's generally not a bad thing, at least I don't think so. But I'm more so a passivist. This is a more ‘me’ setting where I'm working at.

Even though I love what I've made, I do think it's still tethered a little bit to something that I don't necessarily agree with. And I'm growing more and more resentment politically. I think that artists should make some political statements. When I make my abstract art, it's very political actually, because the newness of it is very political. Making art from a better stance is a better thing. I'd love to work the rest of my life at a regular job just to make my art later on and not have it be tethered to something that I don't want to tether to.

I want to live, make art, eat good, and hopefully this stuff gives to other people. I had a solo exhibition in Creston two years ago, and I saw some people that were there looking at a piece of mine. It really didn't have to do with ego at all—it was like ‘Wow, I really am giving somebody conversation, or I'm giving someone something to talk about.’ It's lovely to talk and discuss and have new ideas, and I did that for for two people. That was really cool.

It's been fun getting theoretical with David Nguyen—he's a deep thinker, and his work is authentic, creative and vibrant. I ask if we’ll see him at the August 15 opening of Funkytown where he’ll be showing several pieces. He says that thought alone makes him want to run 10 miles. But, I’m holding out hope he’ll join us for the evening. The exhibition opening reception is from 5 to 9 pm at 106 Gallery, 106 South Division.