Kai Zhang loves making art. He enjoys the sense of invention that accompanies transforming an idea into something tangible and unique.
But what really gives him joy is sharing the product of his imagination with others.
“To me, the magic of art is in the acts of sharing and receiving,” said Zhang, a Yale senior and resident of Davenport College. “I love seeing my art in the hands of others. It’s like little pieces of me that I give to other people.”
In high school, Zhang began making zines — whimsical and sometimes silly handmade booklets on random topics of his choosing. One might contain a comic about making peanut-butter noodles. Another might argue that cats are preferrable to dogs. The well of subjects, he said, runs as deep as one’s imagination allows.
“You can make something out of nothing on any topic you like and then share it with everyone,” he said. “You can make a zine from one piece of paper that you fold or cut into certain configurations. From there, you visit a print shop, make as many copies as you want, and start sharing them.”
At Yale, Zhang has used zines to spread joy. With the support of a Creative and Performing Arts grant from Davenport, he founded the Itsy Bitsy Zine Club, a creative community that encourages its members to express themselves through zines, prints, stickers, photos, or other media of their choosing.
Through a monthly subscription service, Yale College students can sign up to receive bundles of the club’s creative output, which will be delivered to their residential college suites or off-campus housing free of charge.
“It’s a little gift filled with art, left right on your doorstep,” said Zhang, who is from the Bayside neighborhood in Queens, New York.
Zhang, a computing and the arts major, brought his enthusiasm for self-expression and creativity to his other pursuits at Yale. While a peer liaison with the Asian American Cultural Center, he made a zine filled with advice for the first-year students he was mentoring. As a creative outreach fellow at the Office of International Students and Scholars, he hosted a workshop to teach others how to create their own websites. As a student fellow at Tsai Center for Innovative Thinking at Yale (Tsai City), he organized a pop-up café that served beverages with adventurous flavors, such as black sesame and mango sticky rice.
His time at Yale has taught him the importance of friendship, he said.
“I’ve learned to make time for others,” he said. “I want to learn about what my friends are working on — their performances, projects, and little celebrations. It gives me joy to see all the amazing things they are doing.”
After graduation, he will spend the summer in New York City mentoring high school students though an arts-oriented internship program. Zhang, whose parents immigrated to the United States from Wenzhou, a city on the southeastern coast of China, will continue his study of Chinese languages at Taiwan National University through a Richard U. Light Fellowship.
In the meantime, Zhang continues flexing his creative muscle. He is developing a digital tool to help people make comics. And he’s experimenting with making comics with needle and thread — sewing together a patchwork of images and texts into a narrative of his memories.
“I’d love to be able to pursue arts education in the future,” he said. “Whether it be through making zines or websites, I want to inspire others to share a part of themselves and invite more playfulness and whimsy into their everyday experiences.”
