Graphic design, illustration and interview with Swedish comic artist Hilding Sandgren. Konstfack 2016.
During the interview, Hilding told me about how they try to convey different atmospheres in their comics simply by alternating the way they draw: Fast, sloppy, slow, carefully, with much pressure, little pressure and so on.
I thought this was a fascinating technique and found it very representative of Hildings work, which is why I decided to try to highlight it in my visual interpretation of them.
That’s why my “portrait” is made up out of a series of drawings: all of them representing the same motif of Hilding in their studio, and all drawn with the same pencil and (you guessed it) on the same kind of paper. The only thing to distinguish them from each other is the way that they're drawn.
Hildning and I also shared some tips and tricks on how to avoid smudging graphite all over our drawings, which is why that’s just what I put on the cover of the interview (smudged graphite that is).
I liked the thought of letting something that’s often conveyed as a mistake (but actually can be kind of beautiful) take up this
much space and found it a suitable context for a tribute to the creative process as a whole and not only the “perfect”, smudge-free results.
much space and found it a suitable context for a tribute to the creative process as a whole and not only the “perfect”, smudge-free results.