At the 2011 Spring Festival Gala, there was a "four beauties" to pay homage to the New Year, lin chi-ling, Joey Yung and Yu Cuizhi represented Taiwan, Hong Kong and Macau respectively. When it was the turn of the mainland representatives to congratulate, only to see the actress Li Xiaoran holding a "comic rabbit" on the stage, at this time the camera suddenly shifted to the stage, and a young and beautiful girl appeared.
Because of her fresh and unworldly appearance and dress, the woman quickly entered people's sight and was selected by netizens as "the most beautiful audience in the history of the Spring Festival Gala". At that time, the Internet rose to "human flesh search", and under the enthusiastic tracking and investigation of netizens, the identity of the woman was finally exposed, and it turned out that she was a new generation of Chinese cartoonists - Xia Da.
Xiada's popularity is very similar to today's Internet celebrities, and she has attracted attention with her temporary beauty. But when you really get to know this beautiful cartoonist, her appearance will be gradually ignored, replaced by admiration for her character and spirit, so that you are fascinated by her from the heart.
<h1 class="pgc-h-arrow-right" data-track="13" > a family of books, girls chasing dreams</h1>
In 1981, Xia Da was born in Huaihua, Hunan Province, a cultural family full of books. His father was engaged in the restoration of ancient buildings, his mother's job was to identify and restore ancient calligraphy and paintings, and his grandfather was a writer who made a living by writing, naming his granddaughter "Xia Da", which means "Da Ze and helping the world". The strong family atmosphere made Xia Da deeply influenced by classical culture from an early age, and at the age of 4, he could recite the entire "Three Hundred Poems of Tang Dynasty", and began to read classic works such as "The Record of the West Chamber" and "The Book of Poetry".
However, Shada did not think that she was a good student, or a good student in the traditional sense, because she loved to study partial subjects, was keen on reading extracurricular books and comics, and fortunately her family never blamed her for studying.
In Shada's childhood memories, her parents were very busy, they always left things to their own decisions, and did not prepare everything for their children like other parents, so she had misunderstood that her parents did not love her.
But it was her parents' freeing of Shada that allowed her to contact more comics, and after learning that the comics were drawn by people, Shada's heart buried the desire to become a cartoonist. As her fascination with comics deepened, her mother not only did not accuse her, but also hired an excellent drawing teacher to teach her daughter to draw.
During that time, when other children were playing outside for fun, Shada could only hide at home and practice painting for more than a dozen hours a day. It was the extensive interests and solid drawing skills of her childhood that could promote XiaDa to create so many excellent and unique comics in the future.
Overall, Shada's childhood was happy, until the death of her grandfather brought her the first sadness of her life and knocked out her mature thoughts. In the first Qingming after his grandfather's death, Xia Da got the will left by his grandfather to himself: "The little granddaughter has special talents, and should be taught according to her aptitude, and must not be pressed." After reading the content, Xia Da was in a trance for half a sound, and then the tears fell down in large pieces, and it turned out that she had been deeply loved.
At the same time, Xia Da has a philosophy of life: death is the most terrible, and after death, there is nothing left, so we must strive to leave a trace of life for ourselves.
<h1 class="pgc-h-arrow-right" data-track="60" > dreams and hard work</h1>
Natsuda's time was when Japanese animation was in the limelight in China, and works such as "Dragon Ball" and "Cherry Pills" deeply influenced her, making her fall in love with those beautiful pictures and rich plots. Looking at the colorful foreign comics, Xia Da's heart inevitably has some expectations, when she can create excellent comics, and when Chinese comics can also be popular in foreign countries.
When she was a sophomore in high school, because of her busy studies, Shada once stopped studying cello and painting, only to find that she could not put down painting anymore. Following her heart and doing what she wants to do is Shada's usual style, so she chooses to continue to paint while learning, and try to contribute.
Unlike many cartoonists, Xia Da was really lucky, and she was successful in submitting her first article in the magazine Beijing Cartoon, and also received a letter from the magazine's editor, in which she praised and affirmed her. However, because cartoonists were regarded as "improper professions" at that time, Xia Da was admitted to Hunan Light Industry College and studied art and design in order to become a "serious person" in everyone's eyes.
During college, she studied professional knowledge while trying to draw, during which she published a manga single book of "April Story", which is a little famous in the industry. After graduation, under the recommendation of a friend, Xia Da was arranged to engage in film and television internships, and after working for a while, she chose to leave because she was really uncomfortable.
In the days that followed, Shada found a lot of jobs, but none of them met her appetite, and eventually had to return to the "old business". At that time, Xia Da's thought was very simple, she felt that Beijing was the most developed city, that it was a place where "you could support yourself by painting", so she went north without hesitation.
Reality soon gave her a blow, although Shada had already published comics in magazines and earned the corresponding fees through serializations. But in fact, the fees were very small, and it was very difficult to support herself in Beijing in this way, so at that time, Xiada's life in the north was only described in two words - starvation and hard carrying.
As a scholar, Xia Da has not been troubled by the economy since childhood, and naturally does not have too strong life planning ability. At that time, as soon as she received the payment, she rushed to KFC to eat a big meal, and the rest of the money was exhausted after paying the rent, and she could only go hungry for the next few days.
Shada is a girl with strong self-esteem, unwilling to borrow money from others, and even more unwilling to cry out to her parents, so she has to distract herself from hunger by continuously painting. Once, Shada insisted on painting with boiling water, painting for 10 hours, and fainted from her desk hungry.
At that time, Shada was very hard, and later she revealed an "interesting thing": A friend wanted to visit her, and before coming, she asked her what she needed. Xia Da had not eaten for two days, and naturally cried out in her heart, "Of course, I brought food!" ", but the words come to the lips but cannot be spoken. As a result, when the friend arrived, he gave her a bouquet of flowers, and XiaDa cried when she looked at the flowers, crying and saying that it was so beautiful. The friend was blindfolded on the spot, how Xia Da became so sentimental, sending a bouquet of flowers moved her to a very confused.
After all these things, Xia Da finally got the hang of it and began to pay attention to her life. Every time she got the manuscript fee, she would first pay the rent, of course, the house was shared with friends, the cost was relatively low, and then she quickly bought a large bag of rice to ensure that she had surplus grain to eat this month. In order to save the fee, she invented a method of boiling porridge for herself, that is, after cooking rice porridge, add some soy sauce, sugar, chicken essence and a few drops of vinegar, boil for another ten minutes, and finally pour a few drops of sesame oil, not to mention the taste is so beautiful, even small dishes are not needed.
In addition, every time she returns to her hometown in Hunan, Xiada will bring two large jars of meat sauce prepared by her mother. For Shada, it was the only meat dish she could enjoy at the time, and it was very fragrant to eat with steamed buns or rice. In order to dispel her parents' doubts, in the days when Xia Da first arrived in Beijing, she always lied that her writing fees were very high, and she was living a good life, afraid that her parents would force her to return to her hometown because of her hardships.
Xia Da, who later became famous, wrote a paragraph on social platforms to lament her past hardships, she wrote:
For 7 years, I have suffered from hunger, suffered hardships, and been sick by death. I don't go out because I'm lying down to fight hunger, I'm thin because I have a digestive disorder, and my hair is long because I don't have money to get a haircut. Every day I tortured my spirit and body, painted, painted, and sacrificed my own life, so God let me see a glimmer of light.
<h1 class="pgc-h-arrow-right" data-track="61" > gradually became famous and adhered to the heart of painting</h1>
No matter how hard life is, Xia Da has never thought of abandoning comics, and she has always adhered to the essence of her painting, which makes people have to be awe-inspired. In fact, Xia Da does not lack opportunities to make money in Beijing, and can even live a very moist and elegant life.
Shada has a very fresh and unworldly appearance, and a cute baby face is even more fascinating, so an advertising agency has found her. They hoped that Xia Da could become an advertising model for the company, and the work content was very simple, that is, to take some photos with the product, but they could get a few thousand yuan in compensation, and they did not think that Xia Da did not hesitate to refuse.
There have also been galleries that invited Xia Da to work, letting her paint female figures, and she could get paid 100 yuan for each painting, and how much she could paint would be paid. As a result, after Xia Da drew a few pictures, he felt bored in his heart, how he became a photocopier, and the work had no soul at all.
Shada loves comics, and what she wants to do is to inject her soul into the paintings, infusing her passion and thoughts, so she is always running forward, and success is getting closer and closer to her. In 2007, with the recovery of China's animation industry, there were many magazines with comic strips on the market, including one called "Comic Friends".
In 2008, Xia Da began to focus on the creation of a long comic strip "Zi Bu Whisper", which tells the story of a 9-year-old girl Xiao Yu and her parents who moved to an ancient town, and used Xiao Yu as a child's eyes to discover a spiritual nature, interpreting the various connections between ancient towns, landscapes, gods and various fairies and ghosts, which is an interesting and bizarre comic.
When she created "The Son Of Silence," Shada didn't think it would be published, much less how its audience would react. She just put the most effort into the creation, did not fear the hard work, and even began to hate eating and sleeping, because it was a big waste of her time drawing comics. At that time, the young girl had a fantasy: if heaven could fulfill one of her wishes, then let her live without eating or sleeping!
After the completion of the manuscript of "Zi Bu Shu", it was serialized in "Manyou" magazine, and its mysterious and bizarre plot, delicate and unworldly painting style, coupled with the familiar and rich Chinese classical style, soon attracted countless readers. With the wide recognition of readers, "Zi Bu Whisper" directly won the gold medal of the best story comic girl group of the Fifth Golden Dragon Awards with good reputation, and since then everyone has begun to know a powerful beautiful cartoonist Xia Da.
In February 2009, "Zi Bu Shu" attracted the attention of Japanese manga editor Eigen Matsui and Shueisha editor-in-chief Yukio Motegi, who praised the work as "the most beautiful manga in China". Thanks to their efforts, "Zi Mu Shu" officially landed in Japan, serialized in the top manga magazine "Ultra Jump", and later launched a manga single book.
When Shada learned that the work had landed on Ultra Jump, she was so excited that she couldn't sleep all night. Anyone who loves comics knows this magazine, which has serialized the works of many masters such as The Great Twilight, and now Shada's works are gathered with these masterpieces, and it seems like a dream to her. What is even more difficult is that "Zi Bu Shu" has successfully conquered the discerning Japanese readers with its beautiful and aesthetic painting style, leaving them with the experience of "incredible eerie atmosphere and fascinating poignant fantasies".
Jin Cheng, a cartoonist in charge of the publication of the single book of "Zi Bu Shu", once commented that Xia Da's comics have traces of Japanese comics in the form of expression, but their aesthetic core has a strong Chinese cultural heritage.
The popularity of "Zi Bu Shu" in Japan made more and more people pay attention to the author, and they began to reprint Xia Da's photos and works, which became a popular topic at that time. At the strong request of Japanese comic fans, Xia Da also went there to hold a signing party, and the original 1-hour signing was finally increased to 3 hours because of the huge number of fans. What fans are happy about is that such a good comic work comes from a shy and beautiful girl, because she is buried in the autograph the whole time.
<h1 class="pgc-h-arrow-right" data-track="62" > don't pay attention to looks, I just want to focus on painting</h1>
Xia Da was the second Chinese manga artist to successfully break into the Japanese market after the well-known Taiwanese cartoonist Zheng Wen, and his work "Zi Bu Shu" was the first mainland original manga to knock on the door of the Japanese market at that time. Such a beautiful and talented girl, on the way to the throne of the goddess, it is inevitable to encounter some gossip.
"Does she look like a 29-year-old girl?"
"She was able to open the market in Japan because she looked like a Japanese girl!"
"She obviously became famous for her good face..."
For Xiada, who has devoted herself to the comic book career, experienced many years of hardships, and finally achieved the dawn of her dreams, those gossip is a great humiliation to her. When she burst into her mother's arms in tears and told her inner sorrow and grievances, her mother firmly told her: "Child, the mouth grows on others, we can't control it." Don't be fearless to complain, work hard to create, and speak with more and better works! And her father also stood up and promised Xiada that he would always be her strongest support, and she just had to run to her dreams!
Therefore, The success of Xiada is closely related to her good family atmosphere, it is the family affection that allows her to choose her dreams, and it is the family affection that makes her finally become who she is today. In the face of netizens' questions, Xia Da bravely responded: "I am not a star in everyone's mouth, but in my field, there will be no one who does not know me and my works, and I am very confident in this." If I want to be famous by my face, why wait until today? ”
Look, this is the real Shada, who can bravely chase dreams, can cry vulnerably, and can face difficulties strongly, and these characters have been gradually shaped in her comic characters and shared with every reader who loves her. In 2010, XiaDa launched a new work "Godzilla Doesn't Speak", which once again firmed up her idea with a unique name: I don't want to talk, I just want to express my heart with a paintbrush!
Shada's ideal is to become a "master of comics" and hopes to draw the works he wants to express. When more and more people liked her paintings, Xia da was surprised and said: "I used to think that my paintings were not very mainstream, but I was surprised that they were successfully published in China and immediately reprinted." Regardless of whether this thing will be popular or not, the attitude of painting must be sincere, which is something that readers can feel. ”
As her fame grew, Charda's workload increased unabated, and it was more common to work overtime to paint. Whenever Shada began to paint, she would put two cups on her workbench, one for ink and one for drinking water, and they were very similar. Therefore, when she draws very devotedly, she will always pick up the ink cup and take a sip, and find that the corners of her mouth are already stained with ink, which looks very awkward.
Fortunately, the assistant found it in time and replaced the cup containing the ink with a more distinguishable container. Before each deadline, it was The busiest phase of Shada, and she would enter a continuous state of not eating, drinking or even sleeping, with a maximum record of 60 hours of continuous painting. If you ask her so tired, is it worth it? I believe she will reply to you with a smile: "It is very happy to be able to draw what you want to draw." ”
In life, Xiada is different from many girls, she is not keen on shopping, but also feels that the shop is trying on clothes. If you like a style, you will buy one piece in each color, and then you can wear it in a different way, which is very similar to a man. In addition, Xia Da likes to show her face, does not like to wear makeup, and does not often go to the restaurant to eat, just because the party is too wasted time.
Her happiest thing is to lie on the couch in a daze, empty her head, and seize the inspiration. Whenever something came to mind in a daze, Shada would immediately get up, grab some sketches on paper and pencil, and then continue to lie down, continue to be in a daze, continue to communicate with the spirit.
Yes, this is the real Shada, a beautiful cartoonist who is too much of a fantasy in the world, but she is actually so simple, so simple, so focused on her own comic book career, and no longer has the heart to think about the rest. Today, XiaDa is 40 years old, but the years seem to have no traces on her face, and she is more like the "girl next door" with short hair, which is the beautiful girl who will always be in our hearts.
At the end of the article, I would like to give each reader a famous quote from Shada:
The so-called success is a journey from the beginning to the end. A lot of people call the people who come to the end the winners, but in reality it's just that these people go longer. And the final so-called end point, for these people, is only a starting point, at least for me. I'm sure I'll have a long, long way to go, and I don't know where I'll end up, maybe I won't be there when I die, but at least I'm on the way.