Your work spans multiple traditional art forms, from graphite drawings to ink paintings and printmaking. How do you choose the right medium for your projects?
When I don’t work for a client, I just follow my instinct. I love to be able to work on my personal projects wherever I am and so the simpler the tools, the better. A sketchbook and one or two technical pencils, that is all I need. When a client is involved, they usually give me some examples for what they envision and we decide together. Printmaking is a whole different creature, it requires so many tools, a printing press, a lot of space – especially drypoint and etchings. Lately, I have been playing around with linocut printmaking, which is much less difficult to do in a small studio without a printing press.
Many of your illustrations use a muted color palette. What inspired this aesthetic, and how do you think it contributes to the mood or narrative of your work?
I have always been drawn to melancholic, moody, quiet artworks and illustrations. When I was in art school, l everyone would start working on these gigantic canvases, getting messy with paint and other materials, and it felt really negatively competitive to me. I didn’t study illustration. but fine arts, so I guess I was just in the wrong place, because while everyone was working bigger and bigger, I began to draw tiny pictures with colored pencils and graphite and got into printmaking. One of my favorite printmakers at that time was Heinrich Vogeler, and I think you can still see his influence on my works today, even though I got introduced to him when I was still in school, which was like 17 years ago. I think my muted palette and preference for pencils has to do with my love for etchings.
You’ve illustrated both children’s books and adult literature, including iconic works like John Irving’s “Until I Find You”, “If We Were Villains” by M. L. Rio, or Shirley Jackson’s “The Haunting of Hill House.” How does your approach change when working with different genres or audiences?
I usually start off by marking the hell out of a book and doing simple sketches for possible illustrations while reading. I also create something like a moodboard, collect pictures and photographs that fit the mood I want my illustrations to have. When I have my sketches and they get approved, I usually go looking for photo references for poses and then the work begins.
I do want my illustrations to appeal to adults, especially when it is a “dark” or serious book I’m illustrating. I have worked for clients that have given me a lot of creative freedom, but sometimes you’re met with very specific instructions, like not to show any faces. It is my job to make that work, and I like challenges.
Whenever I avoid using any references, that always leads to a look that I would say is more suitable for young adult or children’s books. I do like both aesthetics equally.
You mentioned that you often work in sketchbooks of various sizes. Can you tell us more about your creative process with sketchbooks? How do they play a role in your larger projects?
My sketchbooks are everything to me, I’ve been drawing in books for close to 16 years now. I always take one with me while a larger one stays on my studio desk. I use them for collecting, sketching, drawing and painting – some pages are really messy while others are neat and clean. When I first started the process of illustrating “The Haunting of Hill House” and also later on “We Have Always Lived in the Castle”, I filled page after page with sketches, notes, photo references, until I felt ready to really get going. On those pages you can see the evolution of everything that later is condensed to seven illustrations and a cover.
How do you approach illustrating literary classics with such rich atmospheres and complex themes?
I try to get a feeling for the time the author has lived in by doing research, and I look into their biographies and read their other works if there is enough time. I’ve always loved literature and I have a ton of books. Getting absorbed by a world an author has created is something that comes to me naturally.
With traditional mediums often being so labor-intensive, how do you balance precision and spontaneity in your work?
I think I am pretty fast when it comes to drawing, so I can allow myself to take risks sometimes. If something doesn’t work out I will just trace my own illustration and give it a new try. I sometimes need 5 or more attempts to get an illustration right or I might have to change the concept entirely. Sometimes, the works that have a very “spontaneous” look are the ones I had to redo over and over again. The slipcase for “The Haunting of Hill House” is such a case. I think I redid that whole thing four times and ended up cutting the face from the first attempt only to glue it onto the last one.
That is something I hate and appreciate about ink and watercolor: Trying to fix a problem in a painting can lead to you wasting one or two hours on something that is getting worse minute by minute without you noticing it. In Germany we have a word for that phenomenon called “Verschlimmbessern”. I understand the appeal of digital art forms, but I just don’t want to let go of that would small of a watercolor glass that has stood around for too long, the unpacking of new watercolors like it was candy, applying the pigments to the paper with my own hands, accidentally dipping brushes into my tea and all those little things.
Your work often carries a strong atmosphere and narrative depth. Do you have favourite themes or motifs that you find yourself drawn to? How do you decide what themes or concepts you want to explore in your illustrations?
I feel drawn to so many themes and motifs, I can’t name them all. Anything nature, melancholic, mythical, female power and madness, things that remind me of childhood days. I try to stick to what feels true to me.
Lastly, what advice would you give to young illustrators who want to pursue traditional art forms in an increasingly digital world?
I feel like we’re living in a very peculiar time right now. I see the benefits of AI, but I’m puzzled by what the future world will accept as original art. Does there need to be a human illustrator for something to become just that? How can humans compete with AI-generated images? Will we collectively go see AI-generated art shows in museums? We’re still only at the start.
I have decided that I want to distance myself from these problems as much as possible, and so I choose traditional art forms. I don’t know where this will lead me, but I when asked I’d encourage anyone to follow their gut feeling. I’m only 35 but I dream about having a little hut in the woods and only eating my own grown vegetables and having a donkey and some chickens, so perhaps I’m not the right person to give anyone advice on that matter.
