Hans Lee
- Anna Lilli Garai
- May 27
- 3 min read
Hans Lee’s characters wear confidence like a costume—loud, sharp, and carefully put together. But there’s more behind the surface. His paintings mix street style with quiet emotion, shaped by his path through Seoul, Toulouse, Detroit, and now Tokyo. Each figure reflects something personal, but also something shared: the need to look cool, the pull of isolation, the search for connection. His bold lines and saturated colors carry both attitude and feeling, always holding that tension between outside image and inner state.
Q: You’ve spent time in Seoul, Paris, New York, and now Tokyo. What kind of energy do you carry with you from each place?
A: It was Seoul, then Toulouse, Detroit, and Tokyo in that order. I would say Seoul is the place where I’m from. The city always gives me warm and vibrant energy with strong passion—it’s my root.
Toulouse and all of France gave me artistic energy and a mind full of imagination. From Detroit, I learned diversity and the freedom to be myself as who I am.
Now, as I’m spending my 30s in Tokyo, it has become a process of discovering myself as both a human and an artist. In the end, I feel like I’m a mixture of many different cultures I’ve experienced—and I appreciate who I am.
Q: Your figures have a strong look—cool, confident, a bit distant. Are they based on real people or more like reflections of what you notice around you?
A: My figures are mainly based on me and my personal character. They’re a self-reflection. But since I’m also part of society, I would say the figures also represent people living in the present. These days, everyone is focused on having a cool look to show. But at the same time, people are struggling internally, becoming more isolated from each other. I want to show that through the characters in my art.
Q: How do you balance style and emotion when you paint?
A: Personally, I love to capture the unbalanced moments between the two. For example, someone with a loud outfit might actually be a very calm person.
I see this kind of contrast a lot in daily life. I always observe people—it helps me find that powerful balance between style and emotion while I’m painting.
Q: What pulled you into street culture in the first place?
A: The vibe—the way street culture expresses “freedom” through visuals—was very powerful for me as a kid. I’ve always appreciated how the culture brings raw energy, honesty, and humor into the world.
Q: Is painting more about expressing something personal, or reacting to what’s happening outside?
A: Most of the time, I focus on my personal emotions and feelings. For me, painting is a very personal form of communication. I always try to create things that represent me as much as possible.
But as I mentioned, since I’m part of this universe, the way I feel might also reflect something happening outside.
Q: What keeps you coming back to painting—the colors, the flow, the process, or just the feeling of doing it?
A: Painting gives me the ultimate freedom to tell my story. It’s when I can be 100% myself. That’s why I love painting.
