Andrew Hem was born in Cambodia. At 4 months his parents fled Cambodia from the genocide and ended up in Los Angeles. By age 12 Andrew started getting into graffiti. He studied under writers like dzeas, rek2, lifer, and zoueh. He continued graffiti for about 9 years getting into nothing but trouble. He got introduce to figure drawing in his last semester in Santa Monica College and knew right away what he was meant to do. At that moment he changed his major and pursued the life of an illustrator.