CG-blog

J’ai traduit cette interview en français ici, même si vous ne parlez pas anglais allez jeter un œil à ce site car les images parlent d’elle-mêmes.

I have discovered  monsieurbandit.blogspot.com a few weeks ago. It was one of the best surprises of 2011 for me. Why ? Because monsieurbandit.blogspot.com is a really rich blog about art, street art, illustration, animations and videos. I saw so much amazing stuff that it would be difficult for me to list some. I advise you to go first on that blog and to read this interview next.

Anyway, over to Gilliom

The first 3 things that came to my mind when I discovered your site were (except animation/illustration): Miro, Experimentation, childhood. Your answer?

“Miro”? Yes, I can see that. Lots of the work of illustrators I have chosen to show on Monsieur Bandit could be seen as having similarities with the work of Miro, or maybe Modernism in general. I tend to like work that has strong shapes and composition, but also has “patina”, texture or a certain roughness.
“Experimentation”? Perhaps. I would rather say: “playfulness” (again: Miro). I get bored real easy when experiments become artyfarty conceptual mumbo-jumbo. Life is too short.
Which perhaps brings us to “childhood”? I do tend to consider the eight-year-old-me as a valuable advisor. On the other hand: there is also the desire to be a “Monsieur”. I never wear shorts except on a really hot day and in the privacy of my own home.
(By the way: the name “Monsieur Bandit” refers to my favorite fictional character, the “gentleman burglar”. Yes, ahum…”childhood”, indeed…)

What is monsieurbandit.blogspot.com ?

Two years ago I didn’t even have a computer and disliked the mere thought of owning one. When I finally did get one however, everything changed. Two months later I started Monsieur Bandit, on a whim, without much planning, just for the hell of it. (Perhaps this was the eight-year-old-me again, who loved “publishing” the magazines he made with his father’s typewriter and which he “distributed” amongst his parents and an uncle…).
Basically, it’s just a way of sharing the stuff I’m interested in. Show and tell. That’s it. “Look how neat this is!” I am an illustrator myself, and I can’t help but always being on the lookout for what’s happening and who’s making nice work… Often this will also include animation, typography and graphic design, street art and comics.

Does monsieurbandit.blogspot.com influence your work’s process?

At the moment, very little. I can see where having a blog might help me getting my own work in front of people and I’m certainly planning on doing that some more in the near future. But exactly how that’s going to work is all stuff I have yet to figure out.

Did you meet people professionally through your blog?

Not that I know of. Perhaps some people will follow the link to my portfolio site, but I’m not tracking all that.

I saw that using free software was important to you? Can you tell me more about that?

That’s an easy one: when you have very little money to spend it’s nice to find the stuff you need is available for free. That also means you have no excuses anymore to not be doing something. Whether you want to use a computer for drawing, or blogging, making music or films or whatever, all of this you can just start doing for little or, very often, absolutely no money. If you’re not doing something right now, you’re a putz!

Is visibility important?

Yes, sure it is. I’m glad I’ve been able to attract some more people to Monsieur Bandit than the first few months when a day with 20 visitors was a huge success… And I would like to find ways to get even more people interested.
That being said: I think it is even more important to get some interaction going with the readers, and I’ve not been very successful in doing that up till now. There are a good number of readers who visit and retweet posts very regularly, but very few post comments. Perhaps simply because the sort of posts I put out give little opportunity to comment upon, except for saying “I like it” or something like that. I’m working on some stuff which will hopefully lead to some more conversation.

Why BlogSpot?

When I started out I knew next to nothing about blogging (and very little about computers in general). BlogSpot is free and it’s easy. What more can you want?
I think this is one of the most attractive features of blogging: it is easy. It is fast. It shouldn’t be a hassle. I can post something on a whim and it would only take a few minutes. Or I could take several days to write an article. Both work fine. I like that very much, having that choice.

I use BlogSpot with Windows Live Writer, a free blog editor which I cannot recommend highly enough and which makes setting up a post easy as pie. (By the way: I also like Posterous for the same reasons. free, easy to use, everything comes out looking nice,…)
I understand “serious” bloggers go for WordPress. Perhaps one day I will too. For now, BlogSpot is just fine.

What does (except web sources) inspire you?

Anything. An article in a magazine or newspaper. Some event taking place. A new film. An opening for an exhibition… All can be a good reason to publish something.
I hope to do some more writing on Monsieur Bandit. Work out some ideas about visualization and storytelling. Or about generating ideas and concepts. The more theoretical stuff behind the nice pictures. I’m sure not everybody is going to like that, but that’s alright.

Your opinion about this sentence: The worst brief for an artist is to be told they can do anything. I have always believed that artists are a lot more creative if you tell them what they can’t do. It’s easier to find holes in a wall than it is trying to build out of nothing. (Peter Gabriel)?

Well, that’s a classic.
If you consider the assignment itself as a restriction, I tend to agree. Give me a topic, any topic, providing I understand what’s it about (so no quantum physics, politics or international economics), and I’ll probably come up with an idea for an illustration that same day. Tell me I can do “whatever I want” and I’m death in the water. At least for a weekend.
Also, arbitrarily setting up restrictions can be a way to come up with ideas. But usually, the solution to a problem is hiding in the problem itself. The better you understand the problem (that is: what is needed), the easier you’ll find a solution.
What’s more: everybody comes with his or her own set of restrictions. Your style, your technical capabilities, your intelligence,… So from the get go, you are not going to do “anything”. You’re going to do something you would do.

An “unknown” artist or a blogger you would like to talk about?

AnotherDesignBlog by Kathy Kavan has lots and lots of great collections of mostly midcentury graphic design. And Flyer Goodness has a wonderful variety of posters and flyers and such… I visit both regularly.
An artist who people need to check out is Philip Paquet. He’s an illustrator/comic artist/aspiring tattoo-guy who I collaborate with frequently. I’ve written several scenarios for short story comics which he drew.

Which question I should have asked you (and what is your answer) ?

My favorite color is an orange-like red which shimmers and almost turns into magenta (as seen in painted illustrations from the 60ties), my favorite song is “Let the Sun Shine In” and my favorite food is the chicken my girlfriend makes.

Thanks to Gilliom for his kindness and his sens de l’humour. As well as monsieurbandit.blogspot.com you should really check out  his portfolio

Accueil | Envoyer cet article | Imprimer cet article | Twitter cet article | Partager sur Facebook