Meet Felix Ashamari Chen

We had the good fortune of connecting with Felix Ashamari Chen and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Felix Ashamari, we’d love to hear more about how you thought about starting your own business?
My photography and art business began all pretty happenstance. I honestly stumbled into owning this business, even just looking back at it now. As an Eastern Asian, sports, entertainment, and especially arts, were never considered reliable or successful career paths so I was never encouraged in this direction. But even as a kid I always wanted to create art to share with others and even sell, but it always felt like plan B, or more like D, J, or X. Heck it wasn’t even a plan it was a daydream let’s be honest. Plan A (halfway through college) was pursuing my PhD in Clinical Psychology. I got into a PhD program in 2022 – before realizing prior to my second year I had no future in academia and promptly quit. It was an extremely low point in my life. I graduated from my undergraduate studies at the start of the pandemic in 2020 while I was still pursuing the PhD. Honestly, the pandemic was a very uncertain time but also led to a lot of downtime. I decided to buy a camera for my graduation present and it started simply as a way to just capture my hobby, my drawings and painting. Family friends even began to commission my art. I always loved doing portraits, so I had to take photos of my clients before painting stills of them. But then people just wanted photos of themselves, their engagements, graduations, family portraits, and then, marriages! It’s all happened so fast. But I think that’s how you know you’re obsessed with something and can work as a business. Time doesn’t exist the same when you’re doing what you love. That said, over the years clear goals form the foundation of any successful business, not just what was once a successful and enjoyable hobby. Owning a service and business requires clear communication, professional standards, sales, marketing, and ultimately, knowing exactly what YOUR BRAND is. The process was always stitched together piece by piece, never a fully laid out path, but you get better and better at it if you know what not to do and what to do more of. Looking back at this journey, “beauty” and “celebrating life” was at the heart of what I wanted to pursue here. Furture wise? I’m growing and won’t stop, being paid to do what you love ain’t so bad. I want to scale to 5k-10k/month deals regularly, focusing more on weddings, murals, and the online art print market. I tell myself this all the time: “When you have a vision the path cannot help but reveal itself so long as you take the next immediate step. Just keep going.”. We’re keeping on!

What should our readers know about your business?
Business, if worth doing, is never easy. But It IS worth it! So long as you’re ok with whatever it takes to get to the place you’re envisioning for yourself. Sacrifice, tears, and hard work. It doesn’t also doesn’t hurt to have a lot of fun! Very necessary to have fun. I have had a lot of failed sales calls for my wedding photography, and something that I’ve learned is to reinterpret those as lessons. For example, create a visual slideshow for a sales call, add value, I can offer more types of services, or I need to let them go, don’t settle, and never sell out on your personal values just to make money (I personally don’t do most boudoir requests). I never thought my paintings and art would turn into murals, but now I’m evolving my art career into mural art. It’s been exciting, but if I had never said yes to the first deal I wouldn’t have known if I was any good at it (a very low-priced mural for a friend’s parents’ retirement home). It wasn’t my favorite project but I was still very proud of it because of the process and where it could take me. Just from one project, I learned a lot about painting murals on walls, using primers, drying time, scale/measurement differences compared to canvases. And I’ve learned that I honestly love painting murals and want to continue with commercial buildings. My style has always been soulful, bold, classy, simple, and effortless. If my pictures or art doesn’t make me or the viewer feel a salient clear feeling, I don’t want it out there. Even as you find your style or voice as an artist, you’ll have to distinguish it from the present needs and expectations of your clients who admire your previous work. The better one becomes the better the brand naturally sells itself. I can humbly admit I’m not fully quite there with my brand to have an audience consume my art. More experimentation, art series/collections, and businesses I get to work with, will ultimately help me create a clearer portfolio of my work. That only comes with time and growth.

Let’s say your best friend was visiting the area and you wanted to show them the best time ever. Where would you take them? Give us a little itinerary – say it was a week long trip, where would you eat, drink, visit, hang out, etc.
I would take them to a bakery/cafe I’ve been wanting to go to called Cafe Intermezzo for brunch and drinks. We’ll have to go walk/scooter/bike the Beltline, tour the Beltline market, and head to Ponce City for a treat after taking a stroll through Piedmont Park.

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?
Thank you Sophia, my dear stepmother, for sharing your love for God, beauty in all forms, and for believing in me when I didn’t know how to.

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/suhai_studio/

Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/felix-chen-5b25bb227/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/SuHaiStudio/

Yelp: https://www.yelp.com/biz/suhai-studio-sandy-springs-2