Meet Jiny He | Artist, Creative Founder and Small Business Owner at Numbat Love and House of Mykorisa, Color Educator

We had the good fortune of connecting with Jiny He and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Jiny, we’d love to hear more about how you thought about starting your own business?
I see my business as a platform to introduce whimsical yet meaningful illustrations into our everyday lifestyle. I love my day job of designing color palettes for animation and there’s joy in seeing the fruits of your imagination materialize on screen. I’m lucky to have been doing this as a profession for over a decade now. But there is always a sense of bittersweetness when thousands of beautiful artworks flashes for seconds then usually never see the light of day again. This compelled me to seek ways to take artwork beyond our TV screens. While still doing what I loved in animation, I went back to school to study Interior Design. Going through the design process of helping people decide color, furnishing, and art styling for their properties excited me. Realizing this would lead the path for me to bring art into lifestyle, I got certified as a color consultant to help people bring color into their lives, and began exhibiting my own paintings for sale for people to adorn their homes. These events led to the inception of my company, the House of Mykorisa. In 2020 I was fortunate to have published a fact book about bears, Eight Bears of Our World, in collaboration with non-profit organizations Animals Asia and The Chongqing Bear Rescue Centre. I got to illustrate and write fun facts about the eight unique species of bears of our world. Yet again I wanted more than just having artworks live on book pages. What if I turned these illustrations into wearable art? I always loved silk for its ability to showcase vibrant color palettes when printed on, so silk scarves became the perfect answer. It’s such a luxurious and versatile product that not only can it be styled as a playful accessory, at the same time I had a beautiful medium to propel snippets of knowledge about bears. Definitely a win-win. This was the process that led to my fashion label, Numbat Love.

Alright, so let’s move onto what keeps you busy professionally?
I keep busy by wearing many hats throughout my day. During the day I work professionally as a background painter and color designer for animation. At night I put my business thinking cap on, working to improve my personal art while building my own label.

My art is influenced by my love for color, animals, my Chinese and Australian Heritage- I was born in China and grew up in Australia- my current home in Southern California, and nature. After I established my animation career, I began branching out with my own designs and created my own label. I am fortunate to have won awards for my paintings and illustrations on Mintedd and have Mixtiles feature my artwork for sale. My label Numbat Love was a result of my artistic experience and experimenting with fashion fun. Numbat is a small marsupial animal from Western Australia that looks somewhat like a mix between a chipmunk and an anteater. Most of my art and business concepts themes around animal characters. I think a large part of the inspiration stems from my childhood experiences. I was born in China and moved to Australia around the age of 10. I still vividly remember visiting my dad’s Biology building in China and they had this whole floor dedicated to animal and plant taxidermy. I had a pretty lively imagination and I would imagine going to fantastical worlds with the bears and the tiger. Then when we moved to Australia I remember having lots of outdoor adventures with our family cat. I’m an only child and he was one of my best friends. He was one of those cats that would walk me to the bus stop and chase away dogs. We would crawl through hedges and jump over lizards together. I think all the adventures with these creatures, real or imagined, shaped the way I feel towards animals and nature. These are the topics I want my art to showcase and my business to promote.

Beyond running my own creative business, I work professionally as a Background Painter and Color Designer for Animation. I began my artistic journey at Nickelodeon Animation Studio in Burbank back in 2009 and have designed the color palettes and background paintings for a variety of animated programs such as most recently, the preschool series Storybots: Answer Time for Netflix. I’ve also painted palettes for Moon Girl and Devil Dinosaur for Disney and Marvel (watch out for the release February 10th!), Adult Comedy Series Inside Job for Netflix, DuckTales 2017 for Disney and many more. Color is my absolute favorite topic and I teach a class on Color Theory at the Gnomon School of VFX, Games & Animation in the heart of Hollywood. Gnomon is called the “MIT of Visual Effects” by Fast Company magazine and is the training ground for our next generation of the world’s best digital artists for the entertainment industry. I was invited to teach based on my experiences of having a long running career in animation, my unique perspective and training as a color consultant for interior design, and my personal background in education, I hold a Master of Fine Arts degree and come from a family of educators: my dad is a college professor in soil science/mycology and my mom used to be a high school math teacher. Fun Fact: this is also where the name for my company, House of Mykorisa comes from. The focus of my dad’s research is mycorrhizae: the symbiotic relationship between fungi and tree roots. Mykorisa is my play on the word and its concept. To me, Mykorisa symbolizes the symbiotic relationship between art and life.

If you had a friend visiting you, what are some of the local spots you’d want to take them around to?
LA is such a vibrant and diverse place, both in nature and culture. For inspiration and artistic trips I love the Getty Villa, Huntington Library, The Broad Museum, Gagosian and MOCA just to name a few. Living closer to the northern side of the county I would definitely have to drag my friends on a hike to Escondido Falls and reward ourselves after by feasting it up at Malibu Seafood. From Malibu I love either venturing up North to Ventura or South to Santa Monica and Venice. Recently I’ve been exploring Ventura more and downtown Ventura is a great place to visit. It has a very relaxed vibe. You can’t go wrong with Paradise Pantry and Cajun Kitchen Cafe for brunch and Winchesters is a great pub to grab a drink with friends. If you love the sea there are great spots for paddle boarding or kayaking off the Channel Islands Harbor Marina. Venturing South from Malibu, Cafe on 27 has gorgeous canyon views of Topanga and a local favorite. San Gabriel Valley is of course my go-to area for Chinese food. I love just getting a Mango Mochi Roll from Phoenix Food Boutique. If I’m ever feeling homesick for Yunnan (the province in Southern China where I was born) food, I always go to Yunnan Restaurant in Monterey Park. If I ever have a sudden craving for Australian Meat Pies and sweets, Bronzed Aussie is a winner!

The Shoutout series is all about recognizing that our success and where we are in life is at least somewhat thanks to the efforts, support, mentorship, love and encouragement of others. So is there someone that you want to dedicate your shoutout to?
There are so many people who’ve helped and supported me along the way, and continue to be my biggest inspirations and fan clubs. My friends and my family. In particular I want to give my Shoutout to The Chongqing Bear Rescue Centre. Tucked away in a tranquil forest in SouthWest China, this organization provides care and home to hundreds of rescued bears. It’s the inspiration and collaboration behind Eight Bears of Our World as well as my Numbat Loves Bear silk scarves. My biggest motivation in creating these products is to let people know more about these magnificent creatures sharing our world with us. Did you know there are only eight species of bears in the world and only two out of these eight species have healthy, thriving populations? This means 75% of the world’s bear populations are in some form of danger. I want more people to understand these beautiful animals, the efforts of the many people working to conserve them, and how their well-being is directly tied to our own biodiversity. I hope through my book and scarves, the stories of bears, and the messages of The Chongqing Bear Rescue Centre can be heard and spread in a fun way

Website: https://houseofmykorisa.com/

Instagram: @mintchocojiny, @house_of_mykorisa; @numbatlove

Image Credits
headshot photo: Heidi Marie Photography