#ArtvsHero

There's this tag around going on Twitter about what our influences are for us artists, and I figured I'd share mine! A lot of these were early influences I learned about in school, a few I found surfing the internet, and one I totally mislabeled ;p

The  Absinthe Robette poster was made by Henri Privat-Livemont, not Alphonse Mucha, but the movement in general has been a big influence to my formative years (especially Mucha) and so I decided to leave it in there anyway. I can't believe I completely mistook the artist considering I had that very same poster in my dorm room on my closet door for five years. lol. Oops. Art Nouveau left a big impression on me with its tendency for the art to contain lush lines and depictions, though (that habit of mine to draw obscenely complicated luscious hair/locks is not a coincidence ;p, and neither is my obsession with line and color). 

I learned about Hasui Kawase and Hiroshi Yoshida in my printmaking class. Fun fact: I was originally a painting major. Then I took a printmaking class, fell in love with it, and took it on as a second major, which is how I ended up graduating w/ both painting and printmaking as my main focuses from my degree. Much of what I learned of color was learned during painting class, but there's something about the aesthetic of printmaking -- especially woodblock -- that is exquisitely pleasing to my eye and no one exemplifies that for me more than these two masters of their craft!

Everyone knows about Leyendecker, of course, but few more know about Ivan Bilibin, a Russian 20th century illustrator who not only does everything I love with his lines and color but also depicts some of my favorite stuff: fantasy, knights, and a heapload of myth based imagery that just draws my soul to his work, so of course he'd be on my hero list, haha. You can learn more about him here. Similarly Ghibli, because... you know, storytelling is my jam and they're the best of the best at this. A+ for bright colorful stuff that is my life source.

The last two are contemporaries! James Jean is practically a god at everything he does and Gon`i Montes is a huge inspiration to me as both a POC originating from my native home's neighbor  island of puerto rico, but is also both doing the stuff I want to do (his client list is practically the stuff my client list would look like once it grows up), but is humble and super talented and marries all the things I adore about line and color in ways that blow my mind. I found his and James's work late after graduating and though I rarely look at it much nowadays (it's too easy to get too influenced from things if you look at it too often), I just really adore them both for the things they do and maybe someday my skill level will be that high! A girl can hope. 

Happy Thursday, all!