Student Artist: Hina Jehan '11

Baruch junior Hina Jehan has a lot of work on her hands during the semester. But while some students like to party away their troubles, the human resources major and journalism minor relaxes by putting oil paint on a canvas. The Pakistan-born painter has recently had her work reviewed by NYU's student publication, and is now trying to decide if she would like to make her part-time hobby into a full-time lifestyle.

The Ticker: How long have you been painting?
Hina Jehan: One year – this is my second year.

Did you have any background in painting?
No, I had no background. I started because it seemed like a really fun hobby, something you can enjoy. Especially in a city like this where you're going to school and you're working, and everything is so stressful. I found painting a great outlet.

What were your paintings like when you started?
I started with abstract, so initially it was whatever came to my mind. I just painted. I didn't know where it was going to go, or what was going to happen. At first they weren't that nice, but throughout the year they started improving.

I used to upload the pictures on Facebook and my friends would comment on them and tell me how they're changing, and they keep telling me it's getting better and better. A year later, they'll improve even more.

One of my friends took pictures off my Facebook and he sent them to the NYU magazine, and they said "fine, we'll do a story on it." That's how it started. I already had [The Ticker's] Arts and Science editors' e-mails, so when NYU picked it up I thought I'd have a chance with my school too. It's fun, and it's just funny, you know?

So you didn't take it too seriously?
I still don't. Whatever happens happens. This is one thing I don't expect… it's just for passion.

How many hours per week do you usually spend painting?
In the beginning I would paint at the end of every month. Just to take out the frustration of every single month and just let it go, the way you do it in yoga. It wouldn't take that long.

I bought a heavyweight drawing book and it would have several sheets in it. I would take sheets out of it and I would do six or seven paintings in one day, and then I wouldn't paint for a whole month. Each album has exactly six or seven paintings.

After that I started buying canvases and did it on a bigger scale. I have them all in my room- there's no space for anything else because all my walls are filled with paintings.

Do your parents support this as a hobby?
My mother thinks I'm crazy, because she keeps reminding me that I'm majoring in Human Resources and what does this have to do with it? (…) But my father used to paint. That was when he was younger, he doesn't paint anymore.

He didn't tell me until I started painting, and then he told me. Then I realized that's where it's coming from. But he did landscapes, and I do abstract.

Nobody really understands what it is, and what's going on the paintings. It's basically emotions and whatever I go through. I guess that's the best way to capture all those memories and experiences, both good and bad.

Do you mostly use color to express your emotions?
I use oil paints, mostly. The beads and glitter came out much later. I took this graphic communications course with a professor who's also a painter. I asked her what I can do with these paintings- how do I get them to the galleries, and should I sell them?

She told me what happens in galleries is usually they take most of the commission. She said if you take the small paintings and start selling them on home-made sites, more people would buy them and you'd get to practice and have fun. Now I'm trying to make a shop on Etsy and see where it goes.

Do you ever plan what you're going to make?
No, that's a really bad idea. I don't get the same satisfaction from it. Sometimes when I'm painting I don't even use a brush. It's fingers and my hands, and I just let it all happen.

When I try planning, I kind of ruin the effect.

At what point can you start calling yourself an "artist"?
I guess it's when other people like your work, and they see that there is talent. I never called myself an "artist". I guess I realized I was one when my friends and everyone else said, "You have something, and keep doing it." That's when I realized I was into it.

Do you feel more responsibility to produce now that your work is being reviewed?
I don't look at this as work, ever. The moment you start looking at something as work, it loses its essence.

It doesn't really matter what other people are going to say or think about it, because at the end of the day, it's about the joy that I get from it.