Interview

· What inspired you to take up illustration as a practice?

The main thing that pulled me towards illustration was just how open it seemed to be. At the time I was heavily invested in becoming a graphic designer but discovering that there was this area of art where you could create so many varied kinds of imagery without any guidelines or rules and being able to use all kind of tools and equipment and create images in any style was incredibly appealing to me and I haven't looked back since.

· Why did you choose to take this particular path in illustration?

As I get older the more I realise that I want to tell stories and illustration opens up so many different ways to accomplish that. For me personally I never wanted a job that was the same thing day in and day out, I never wanted to have a regular office or retail job and illustration is the job where within the same month you could be working on a logo design, children's book illustration, poster prints, zines, screen printing, animations, ceramics….the list goes on and on and that openness is what speaks to me.

· What do you enjoy most about creating work?

The biggest obstacle that I faced when I started university was the fear of putting pen to paper and committing an idea that wasn't fully fleshed out onto the page, but after a few years of working to push past that I see that it is in fact what makes art and illustration so truly special. That the idea doesn't have to be perfect, that it can be rubbish, that it may even be terrible, but that all concepts and ideas truly start as a seed of an idea within your mind and that through practice and building up that creative muscle, we are able to grab a pencil and give that idea a physical form to be shown to others.
Maybe I am overthinking it somewhat but to me the act of taking something like an idea from inside of your head and being able to reproduce it in a visual way for others to look at and relate to is truly special and for me that is my favourite part of illustration.

· Is there a specific style or colour pallet that you try to stick to and if yes what has inspired you to do so?

It really depends on the project that I am working on. I feel like the best skill that an illustrator can have is an adaptable style and being able to work in any given style to match the brief. I would often stress that I had not found my “style” yet and would worry if I ever would! It wasn't until I started to notice certain people in the class that were creating the same kind of work for every single project that I started to see it as something that can potentially hold us back. I started to think about the work that I was creating and realised how boring it would be to draw in the same way day after day. I liked that I was able to draw cute child friendly characters whilst also being able to create dark graphic novel style images that would make your skin crawl. This will boil down to each individual artist but I think no matter what certain elements of your work will naturally stand out. For me it was my bold line work and colour palette choices. People would often say to me that they could tell if a certain piece was done by me even at a glance. I could never see it myself but certain things will peek through even if it is subconsciously.
As far as colour palettes go it depends on the project. I think it can be very beneficial to practice working within a restricted colour palette and often being able to use any colour can be incredibly overwhelming, at least that was the case for me. I have a soft spot in my heart for the black, red and white colour combo thanks to my final major project “The Devil’s Playground” as I think they just work so well together, but I wouldn't use that for absolutely every project I do after that.

· What would your creative process entail? – from the beginnings of an idea to the finished work?

The creative process is very unique in that something that works for me could be the absolute worst way for you to work. A crucial first step in my process may be your final step, and I find that really interesting. A huge part of the process for me happens before I have even picked up a pen or pencil. I will often have an instant visual idea of how it could look and whilst it is important to make a note of those initial ideas, it is also just as important to continue to mould and sculpt the ideas and not just jump on the first one (I am guilty of this and the incredible Fiona White helped me see that the ideas you take the time to develop are often the best).
A big part of my process that has grown from my time at uni has been creative writing. I have never considered myself to be a writer but after the workshop I have found that it is just as useful for me to write about my work as it is to sketch out ideas. It helps me process the idea in an entirely new way and helps me see it from all new angles.
The best advice for the creative process is experimentation and an open mind. Experimentation will lead you to entirely new areas that you hadn't even considered yet and an open mind will help you see the possibilities even when something isn't how you initially thought it would be.

· Do you often (if ever) make collaborative work, if yes how would you describe your experience working with other artists or authors?

I would say that collaboration is a very important part of the industry and is a huge part of networking. Your class is the perfect place to make those early connections with people whose opinions you can trust for things like feedback and sharing ideas. In terms of more formal collaboration I am actually currently working on a brand new zine project with my previous tutor Robin Chevalier which spawned from noticing that we both had a love for the aesthetic of western movies. It can often be hard for me to work collaboratively as I can sometimes be a bit of a control freak when it comes to my art but as I said in the previous answer, keeping an open mind often leads to better work and if I didn't have an open mind the zine would not be moving in the direction that it currently is and I am incredibly excited about the new direction. I think the most important thing is to collaborate with other artists whose work you love, that way discovering where a project will end up is a back and forth between the two of you.
It can sometimes be challenging to work with non creative people on a creative project as I truly believe that creative people think in a very different way to most people. It can sometimes be hard to translate ideas or get certain things across to people who may not understand that it takes more than just the click of a button to redraw an entire section of a design within an hour's deadline!

· Do you think it is difficult to be successful in this industry?

I think the creative industry is incredibly competitive and very hard to be successful in. It can be especially hard because if you are an illustrator that truly has a passion for what you do it can be very hard to make that work within a business environment, which is unfortunately what most of us will have to do in order to earn a living. Especially with things like social media where one person sharing your work that has hundreds of thousands of followers can be the game changer and suddenly give you tons of potentially new customers, but unfortunately for most of us we wont get that lucky.
I am currently experiencing how hard it is to break into the industry. It can often feel like most of the time you are pleading for somebody to give you that opportunity to show what you can do but with so many artists and so few roles it can be tough. It is very important to stay motivated and to keep working on personal projects so that when those opportunities come that you can show your portfolio and they will see that you haven't just been sitting at home waiting for somebody to hire you. Personal projects are important as it allows employers to see that you are proactive in creating work and that shows a real passion for the subject.

· How would you define success in this industry?

I think success is something that each individual artist/ illustrator will need to define for themselves. It is something I have been thinking a lot about recently. I have been trying to think about what I want to accomplish with my work and what success means to me. I have always thought to myself that even if I was poor and homeless that I would still create art one way or another, and to me that says a lot about my art, by having a high value on being able to be creative. I think it is impossible in society today to completely ignore money as a motivation for success, but for me when I think about it I want money so that it allows me to continue to be able to create art and stay creative, so that I can fund my projects and ideas.
I also think it can be hard to ignore the social media side of things for success as it can be easy to get swept up in chasing likes and followers. For me it came down to not wanting to post work that I wasn't proud of or wanted to show just for my Instagram profile to stay relevant. Some people will post daily sketchbook drawings or just random posts to keep their engagement up but I never wanted to let my quality drop just to gain a few followers so for me it became important to ignore social media as a marker for success.
Success for me is being able to look at work that I created a few years ago and hold it up next to something I did recently and to see the differences. If I look and see that they are mostly the same I would see that as a failure that I haven't progressed or grown in my art. But if I hold them up and see the differences and see the progression in my abilities, to me that is success.

· How do you publish your work? Do you create physical reproductions or is it all digital?

Some pieces of work will stay digital and exist only in my hard drive for eternity, others will become zines, prints etc. I think a valuable skill as an illustrator is being able to monetise your work and turn a series of random drawings into a zine, or a little sketch in a notebook into a lino printed card design to sell. Some designs you will feel that they have that certain appeal that could potentially sell well and others you will know aren't worth being made.
If you have ever been to an illustration or craft fair you will likely see pieces that you are instantly drawn to and would consider purchasing. Next time you see an art print or something that you would consider buying, ask yourself what it is about it that has made you feel like parting ways with some cash. Is it because the subject is something that you love? Is it because it is something that is so far from the work that you do that you feel you are drawn to it in that way? Think about why you want to own certain pieces but others you are happy to look at for a moment and move on. The more you do that, the more you will start to do it naturally with your own work. Is this something I think people would want to buy? If I passed this on a wall would I want to stop and have a closer look? It will help when deciding which pieces of your own work to publish.

· If you do publish physical reproductions of your work, what process do you use to do so?

I start by looking at ways that other artists I like have done things. It has always been important to me to keep my work at a high quality so things like paper weight and print quality is something I always try to consider. The main thing for me is to think about what I would expect if I was spending money on something. I know that I wouldn't be happy to buy a book and see that the picture quality is blurry and that it feels like it was cheaply printed on tracing paper. A large part of publishing your work is the experience you are giving the customer and the best way is to think about your own experiences.
I have published work via sending and paying for projects to be printed, bound etc whilst also doing the process entirely by myself. In my second year of uni I created a risograph printed zine called “Dead Rose”. It was created by printing two colours on each side of an A3 piece of paper and then folding it and cutting it in the middle to create 8 pages and a poster in the middle when opened out. This experience was more valuable to me than sending it off to be printed as I had a physical involvement in creating my product and felt like I was creating each one to be perfect for each customer. This has become harder now without access to the print room and risograph machines at uni but I still try to have a physical involvement in my projects whenever I can.