Ask the Illustrator
A couple of your Qs and a couple of my As…
Q: What’s your favourite colour?
A: Since I was a kid, it has always been orange. Lavender and turquoise are a close second.
Q: If you had one day to live, what would you draw?
A: Something that would make me smile I guess. Maybe a bunch of Kewpie babies picking wildflowers, doing yoga and dancing under a disco ball. Wait, that could actually be cool - brb going to go draw it right now.
I call this…the 3 keys to a happy life: yoga, nature & dancing
Q: Black or blue pen?
A: In school it was always blue because I thought black looked too messy, but now I use black. I can’t pinpoint the change but I suspect I probably got given a black pen that I really enjoyed writing with and that rewired my brain to like black pens better.
Q: Who are your artworks for?
A: What I really love about what I do is tapping into the slightly off-beat - creating those artworks that just HINT at a ‘something is strange about that person’ vibe. Like you could have the artwork in your home and it looks cool enough to not ring any alarm bells but it is just strange enough to let your mini freak flag fly. So whether you are full on freaky or 50% freaky and 50% deaky, I’m here for you and I’ll keep on creating the artworks that make your inner weirdo feel seen.
Q: What are your long term goals as an illustrator?
A: My goal is to forever be growing and developing my skills. I’ve always wanted to get into textile design and would love to work with a gift wrapping company (or go at it alone) to develop and promote sustainable and reusable gift wrapping. Also, designing an oracle card deck is on the cards (literally) but this will be a long term project - so if you like magic and witchy stuff, stick around and you’ll be in for a treat.
Q: What do you love & dislike about having a home studio?
A: As I am writing this it is pouring with rain, so yeah, not having to leave the house is something I love about getting to do my work at home. It is, also something I dislike. I find that I really have to motivate myself to leave the house, even on beautiful sunny days.
I also just love my home. It’s got cats, snacks, midday showers on gloomy days and sunshine that reflects off the pool and onto my ceiling, so getting to spend time in my favourite place is a huge plus.
The biggest downside to working from home is you really start to notice the clutter and mess. I struggled to get any work done for the first few weeks because all I could see was mess. But I decided to use this urge to clean to my advantage. Now I dedicate every Tuesday to cleaning and decluttering and doing those big organisation jobs that burden your mind throughout the week. So far I have reorganised the linen cupboard, rearranged the whole kitchen, sorted through my 100s of candles, played around with a new lounge room layout and so much more.
Q: What’s your favourite piece of art?
A: Impression, Sunrise by Claude Monet.
I love how the orange almost vibrates against the contrasting muted tones.
Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Impression,_Sunrise