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Toronto- based illustrator Ben Shannon loves fly-fishing, collecting comic books, and - most of all, he says without apology - bad art. So much so that he and a friend once retrieved a six foot painting from a dumpster and delivered it to MOBA, the Museum of Bad Art that's located in the basement of the Dedham Community Theater, a somewhat rundown movie house in Dedham, Massachusetts. "It's really strange," Shannon says, "you get a good laugh out of it and then you stop and look at it and you think: Wait a second, this could actually work."
The Canadian-born artist knows all about making artwork, thanks in part to his training and mentors. After graduating from Sheridan College in Oakville, Ontario, in 1997, with honors in the school's illustration program, Shannon worked as an assistant to such influential illustrators as Leif Peng, Jeff Norwell, René Milot and Vince McIndoe. "I like the human form against something ridged and manmade," Shannon says. "All of those guys pull it off so well." One of Shannon's depictions of the human form was featured in the October 11, 2001, issue of Rolling Stone magazine. Shannon illustrated The Strokes, the youthful New York City band, sitting on the edge of a swimming pool watching synchronized swimmers perform. "It was great because the glitzy, colorful swimmers are such a great juxtaposition to the band who are just guys wearing leather jackets," Shannon says. With work spanning the fields of advertising, fashion, music, beauty, magazines, publishing, and animation - Shannon's client list includes Nike, Nylon, Images, Bliss UK, The National Post, CBC, IBM, American Eagle Outfitters, Ogilvy & Mather, and Nabisco - the illustrator has come a long ways from his early days when he faced moral dilemmas. He recalls his first rendering job: providing happy characters for an overly sweet cookie that was being turned into a breakfast cereal. Shannon says he went to the old-hand illustrators who were working there and asked, "Is this right? Should kids be eating this?" Their advice: take the money, and as you become more established you will have the opportunity to voice your opinions. "It's nice that I pushed out of that area," says Shannon. "It wasn't such a good feeling compared to what I'm doing now." Altpick.com recently spoke to Ben about his illustrations and the human form.
The Rolling Stone's art director supplied me with a generous amount of reference photos. I was able to find a few Web sites with the band's guitars so they would be accurate. I drew/painted the band and swimmers in Photoshop with a Wacom tablet. Any ridged or technical elements were fleshed with Illustrator. I ended up following about one eighth of the reference shots. It was really cool that they gave me so much freedom to go in any direction I chose. Do you have a favorite illustration? There is one illustration on my Web site with a girl's head cut off. She is wearing a red shirt and spinning a record that says RCA on it. I was really happy with how that turned out.
- Contributed by Mary Beth Holland |
Did you do that for RCA?
So the increasing prevalence of computers in the illustration and design industry has been a positive experience for you?
