Finally, it is time for a new inspiration session. I hope I manage to transmit all the motivation and positive influence I got from Emil Oscar. He is an incredibly talented and hard-working designer and he certainly knows a thing or two about the creative field. This will also be helpful for those of you who want to pursue a career in the field of design or illustration, getting first-hand tips from a professional in the area is the best way to get new knowledge. I have had the privilege to have Emil as my design teacher and supervisor for some time and I have always admired his approach, attitude, and ability to motivate and inspire his students. Teaching and design done with passion can never be done bad.

I recently visited Emil’s first exposition and I got heavily inspired, I wanted to know more. How did he achieve this? How did he get his style? What motivated him? So I decided to ask him for an interview and he was kind enough to accept and be part of the next inspiration session.

Before we go into the interview, be sure to check out his amazing work on his webpage, Instagram, and Facebook. I highly recommend following him and his upcoming projects, I can guarantee he is working on something really good.

So let’s get to it!

1. First of all, it would be nice if you could start with a short introduction for those who don’t know you. Who is Emil Oscar? 

I’m a design teacher, I mostly do illustrations and album covers. I write songs as well – for myself and for others, in my spare time. That’s my passion – music and design.

2. You are a person with unique personality and many talents. How and why did you decide to go into the field of illustration and design?

I was always drawing and writing words down as a child, I eventually started doing music for some time and incorporated drawing in it – doing illustrations and covers for my music. Then I started working with others, got assignments here and there and that was really good because it is difficult earning money only on music. I love design and I am lucky I got to practice it and get projects.

I wrote on everything, even on my uncle’s car. He didn’t like it. But I was very small, very, very small at that time.

3. This leads me to the next question – was this something you always wanted to do since you were a child or is it a passion that you discovered later in your life?  

Yes, definitely. I was always passionate about drawing and creating stuff. It is a passion that got developed and grew into a career.

4. What motivates you to keep going and what is the inspiration behind your latest projects (The Koofiez)?

I’m sketching all the time, it’s like meditation to me. Just sketching by hand, no computer. The phone and the PC are always around me and sketching helps me get away from them for a while and collect my thoughts.

I eventually decided to digitize the best of my sketches. They looked good and I decided to print them out, I found a good place and things happened. I have plans for each year – I want to do an exhibition anually and put out a set of limited edition stickers for each one.

*Koof – slang meaning “just kidding”, “psych”

5. How does your process go?

I always start by sketching by hand. It might start with me being bored at a meeting or having a lot of work at home that’s practical and I need to draw and get creative otherwise I go insane. You know when you have a hobby you do to relax, I think I create stuff to relax. Stuff that’s my own, you know.

6. For every artist, finding a unique style is one of the biggest challenges. How did you find yours?    

Well, when I was young I had some friends who did graffiti. I didn’t have the guts to do it that much, I just did a little and I would draw more at home. They were really good at doing letters and I was more into using my imagination to create creatures and different characters. So I would do kind of cartoons to escape into this other [cartoon] world. And it kinda stuck with me. The style – I use a lot of time to get clean lines, I clean my sketches, which gives a personal touch. It’s a good feeling to smooth things out. It’s like knitting in a way, it’s a slow, good, rewarding process. Everything is so fast-paced nowadays if you have something to do where you can concentrate you can also think a little bit more. I encourage my students to draw and sketch in my classes because it’s a sign of intelligence to be able to produce creative doodles and it also increases the mechanical skill. Unless it’s too mathematical, of course.

7. Are there any specific artists you look up to? 

I got inspired mostly by street art and graffiti. It’s the colors and the lines. I like a surreal artist called Ralph Steadman, but that’s a different ball game.

I actually must admit that most of my inspiration comes from computer games, cartoons, and videos. I like to watch computer trailers with different graphics and styles. Like the Japanese stuff for example. A lot of art is happening in the game industry I think. I also like styles that are different like Adventure Time and Ricky and Morty, I don’t watch it that much but I think the art style is quite unique. A lot of crazy stuff is happening and it’s very funny and entertaining [SpongeBob Squarepants for example].

8. What is the most important thing you have learned about design and illustration?  

Well, you have to listen to the people you trust. There is a lot of ego in some designers. They have a certain style, they think they are Gods or something, and they are like – you just have to stick with your manuscript and do the same thing.

It’s difficult because you can stay consistent with a style, but not for too long or else the style becomes you. You get lost and don’t improve.

So I think every other year you have to switch up a little bit. You have so much personality when you draw, regardless of who you are. You can switch it up once in a while, be productive and experiment, be really active in social media (get your art out there), have fun and don’t listen to people who say ”NO”. Do whatever is in your heart.

9. The top 3 tips for aspiring illustrators/designers by Emil Oscar : 

1. You have to work a lot, copy a lot until you get your own style.
2. Figure out how to get into comminutes and use a lot of social media.
3. 10% is the product 90% is how you sell the product. Who you are selling it to, what’s the business plan? It’s a lot about networking. I realized I sell a lot better in the real world and not so good on the internet for example.

You also need to be careful how you price it. You need a plan, for instance, if you have limited edition prints you can sell them for a lot more because they are super limited. But if you are doing regular posters you can’t have the price too high. Persuasive design helps a lot, there are thousands of tips and ways of persuading people to buy your stuff.

10. What is the next project you are working on? Can we expect a similar gallery event as the last one, what should we look forward to?    

I want to do exhibitions each year and I want to keep the title and just add subtitles. I was thinking about two things. Going more surreal for the next one or a concept around SPAM. I want to create art out of phishing mail, glitches, click baits, etc. I want to do it with video artists, so we would turn all these errors into art. Maybe I will draw on top of them; it would be really fun if you come into a lot of phishing mails like potency pills and “get rich” and so on – the really funny ones. Some glitch art might be really good as well.

But maybe this will come later, for the next one I already have the style and some of the prints, I did some prototypes at the last expo and people really like the new ones too. They have the hand-drawn style and people really like that, it’s really fun to do so why not? I also want to do a little magazine with all the sketches and processes. It will be up on my page and quite cheap really soon.

11. Are you willing to make collaborations with aspiring artists? What do you think about collaborative projects in general?     

Of course, I love that. If it makes sense, of course. If you do collaborations you have to find what the other artist ambition is, what he/she is good at. For instance, I did a children’s cartoon and I have obviously used a lot of screechy colors and stuff. The other artist, I collaborated with, was really good with shadowing and doing the natural style of colors. So we would work together to get a more natural look. I think you need to collaborate with people who are good at what you are not, who do what you don’t. If you are too similar you might just argue and get conflicts.

I could go on, asking millions of questions, but as you might gather Emil is a busy person. For me, this was a really inspiring session and I got a lot of good tips from one of the most creative people I have met. I really hope you can also feel the passion and motivation and use it to start your own project, develop your own drawing style, or just go and do whatever is in your heart (that quote will stay with me for a long time).

Thanks a lot for reading, I hope you enjoyed this short interview. Stay tuned for more Inspiration Sessions and posts on various topics really soon!

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