What are your inspirations for drawing? Like other artists or things
I'll start with my biggest inspiration, which got me into art as a whole: Adam Adamowicz. I got introduced to him through Skyrim concept art, but I honestly think his Shivering Isles concepts are some of the best concept art out there. You can see how much he just takes an idea and completely sores with it. A torrential stream of beautiful sketchy goodness.
I love Oblivion's flat ass dough faces and early Xbox 360 charm, but this shit is simply crazy. Look at this, it makes you wish to dedicate your life to bringing this to life, as all good concept art should. It inspires more of itself.
I could post all the images there are out there, because I sincerely think this is the type of work that has stuck with me the most. It's something to strive for. You can see it for yourself instead.
That was what got me started. After that, and through my journey on Tumblr and Twitter, I think what stuck to me the most was the art done by small artists, my "compatriots". The things you don't see. There is so much love in little things, and maybe in another universe there are entire cultures dedicated to them. I wish we had time to explore each and every one of the smallest pieces of media, especially narrative media, weird media.
I'll concede that it's a bit of an abstract thing to be inspired by, but once you realise how much work goes into the smallest of things, I believe you'll find inspiration anywhere you go. I think the reason why my Batter drawings are the way they are is my inspiration from just the design of letters and fonts in general. I think making something that blurs the line of symbol and representation over and over is fun.
One artist that has stuck with me is the late great Gunner Leatherwood. He passed away earlier this year. I watched this guy grow from a hundred followers to thousands. I saw his art improve. I think that inspiration transcends just the visual aspect of the art. It's a story, a lived experience, as all art is, but I felt I understood it much more. I think going after and following these small artists pay off because of this. Everyone can make something truly great, and some people have and no one noticed. Many amazing animated movies have been made, but never got to the people who would understand them, who'd have dedicated themselves to easing other people into it.
We like to think we understand media in a completely intuitive, isolated fashion, but it's not true at all. Our shared experience contributes to classics being recognised and loved. Sometimes you need the right person at the right time to understand.
Gunner was a great artist because of how intuitive and visceral his drawings were. It was like he was drawing from his entire life experience to express himself in a page. At first he had little control of it, but with time it was molded and polished so that the madness was discernable, but not gone from the drawing. His mindset for drawing was fun, and he too was always going after small artists of all kinds.
But going back to Batter drawings and abstraction, an artist that has also inspired me over the years in that aspect of bluring symbol and representation into one solid thing, and similarly started somewhat small like Gunner, is Matt Lesniewski. His hatching is out of this world, and his character design is evocative and never boring. The characters are huge balls of symbols made into physical objects. Recently he straight-up draws the belts of characters floating. It's wonderful.
Another artist that does this bluring very well, and is very inspiring, is nailgun waowao. They really, well, nail the appeal of making images that have all the defining elements of a certain scene or character, but open closer look they are fragmented and completely abstracted. It's like a bigger image overlayed with many smaller stories and symbols.
But to go back to talking about active inspirations that came before, and got to me to where I am at the moment, it's a bit harder. I can't really make it sound smart besides going "uuh I don't know like abstract stuff, cubism idk lol." Just try to appreciate the great things your friends make, and try and work together to make something even greater.
Some of the most improvement I had in art was from learning with friends. Art ultimately is a form of communication, understanding other people and yourself will make you better at it. Technical skill is fun and speaks for itself, but your experiences will reach much deeper. In a world where we can't even beging to compreehend the powers that be, loving and understanding what is close is probably gonna make your life and art much better.
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blakekathryn
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