May Tai is an abstract expressionist artist. Her art stages her emotions and interpretation of life with collaged images and simplistic designs of lines. Born in El Paso, TX and raised mostly by her aunt and grandmother as first generation American in a traditional Chinese family, May Tai’s inner struggles and perception of her life fuels her creativity.
Born to educated, well-traveled, loving parents, May Tai’s parents firmly believed a citizenship in America would give their child unlimited opportunities in her future. As a newborn, her parents took her home to Hong Kong to start the new chapter in their lives. At the age of six, they decided to send May Tai to America to be raised by family members to enhance her education and life experiences. A child knows innately when there is a lack of sincere love, security and nurture when raised by another child’s parents. It was hard for May Tai to grasp consciously this intuitive feeling growing up, and even harder to comprehend the huge gap between the Western and Eastern cultures. Fortunately, she is truly her mother’s child and was independent and head strong enough to forge her own path with or without permission.
May Tai discovered art at age 8 through her competitiveness and need for attention. Drawing was a natural talent she possessed that did not need extra effort, money or attention to be provided by her American guardians. Her drawing was a positive emotional outlet and she welcomed the praise from everyone on her abilities. High school art classes provided basic skills and techniques she needed to excel. It gave her the confidence needed to pursue her art degree in college. Her college experience at University of Texas at El Paso expanded her media to collages and acrylic and oil paints while challenging her ability to express herself through her work. Since college, May Tai has relocated to New York and continues to tap into her creative spirit inspired by life experiences. She is excited to share her work that encompasses various media and degrees of rendering from abstract to pictorial representation.
To contact May Tai, please e-mail her at maytai@maytaimoments.com
My story is not extraordinary. I’m a simple girl who wear my heart on my sleeve. I believe in taking chances, in love and in living life passionately. This website is more than a portfolio of my artwork; it is my side of the story, my emotions, my life moments captured by lines and colors in images. Thank you for visiting my website.
Prints of my work is available for sale. Please e-mail me at maytai@maytaimoments.com for more details.
Finding Me is my first pure oil painting I completed. Prior to this painting my work with oil was always mixed with collage. My challenge to myself with this piece was to use only color and strokes of a paint brush to convey what I had to say.
Prints are available for sale.
Medium: Pen on paper
This is a very meaningful piece to me based on the idea of a mandala. It is the first original creative thing I felt I completed after a long period of unproductivity as an artist. This mandala was inspired by amazing moments in my life and everything it represents continues to inpire me today. I completed two other mandalas using similar shapes and lines with gold and silver markers on black paper; the first two mandalas were gifts to people in my life and the third of the three was donated to a silent auction that helped raised over $8000 to Make A Wish Foundation August 2009.
Mixed Media: collage and oil
I dream in color, yet my favorite way of expression in art has always been in the gray scale between black and white. I stumbled across this idea of painting over copied images when I wanted to paint a memory of my childhood with my dad. In my desire to convert all color into black and white, I used a copy machine to blow up a small colored photograph. I had wanted as much detail as I could get and before I realized it, I had twenty copies of specific areas I wanted to focus on. When I started to piece these parts together, I fell in loved with how they layered unevenly with missing areas of the image… and the idea to collage with oil painting was born. As I started to paint this, it felt natural to use color to fill in the missing areas.
Prints are available for sale.
Mixed Media: acrylic, pastel, pen and pencil
Every medium in art carries its own charm; pastel and watercolors can be so soft and delicate, pen and pencil can be bold and defined, acrylic can be quick and energetic while oil can be rich and calm. As an artist, I am mindful of how different mediums can work together to deliver the mood I want my piece to personify. Searching for Me is such a collection of many moods and ideas that it seemed fitting to use different mediums to conceptualize the piece.
Prints available for sale.
Mixed Media: collage and oil
El Paso, TX encompasses a large population of Army members and families because of Fort Bliss, TX. When the U.S.-Iraq War started in 2003, our local newspaper was covered with stories and images of the events and deaths along with heartbreaking images of soldiers minutes from departing from their families. This painting is collaged with collected articles and images on the many who had already lost their lives during the beginning of this war and the many leaving to join the fight. I deeply believe those who serve are everyday heros and their committment to duty is beyond words. This painting was donated to 3rd Ba, 6th Bde at Fort Bliss, TX.
Mixed Media: collage and oil
My family is not sentimental; they do not research family history or document their lives for the next generation. We take a few family photos here and there, but I had never seen photographs of my family taken before I was born. When I came across a beautiful portrait of my grandmother in her twenties, I was in awe… with the style of the photograph and with seeing a completely new side of the same grandmother I lived with. With this painting, I exposed and duplicated the way the copy machine left white lines in my copies of this photograph and warped parts of the background and floor.
Medium: pen on paper
My State of Mind series started during high school as an art assignment. My art teacher traced everyone’s profile on drawing paper and each of us is suppose to be draw about ourselves within the profile. I used placement of shapes as interpretation of myself at that time.
Prints are available for sale.
Medium: pen on paper
In college, I was asked again to portray myself in my basic drawing class. It seemed fitting to use my high school art assignment to complete this task. It is interesting to look back now and see the growth in my drawing style between State of Mind I and State of Mind II. It is even more interesting that even though the two drawings were done at least two years apart, I used such different images to communicate very similar thought ideas. That said, I’m not sure how comforting it is to know that my view of myself in life had not grown or changed in those few years.
Prints are available for sale.
Medium: pen on paper
When I came across the first two drawings of this on-going series after many years of storage, I decided to see what I would draw at this point in my life. This drawing is more therapeutic than I realized.
Prints are available for sale.
