Interview With Illustrator Magomed Dovjenko

Magomed Dovjenko, one hell of a guy, is a freelance illustrator based in Germany. He made some well known designs such as the the squirly typographic artworks for adidas, reebok & NFL. We already featured his portfolio here. In this interview we talk a little bit about his design background and some new projects he is working on

My name is Magomed Dovjenko and I’m a freelance Illustrator residing in Germany. I work mainly in design disciplines such as Illustration, Graphic Design and Art Direction.

1. First of all we would like to thank you for taking the time to provide abduzeedo.com with this interview. Please tell us more about your art and design background and what made you become an artist and designer?

I was always, since my childhood drawing and doodling around, together with my father. He teached me to draw until I could draw my first dragonball characters, and that's where it all started! Some years later ( 3 years ago ) I wanted to take it to the next level for fun, so I tried out doing work in a digital way, per photoshop.So after experimenting for 1 year, I finally got to Illustrations, which I practice professionally now.

In the past years I’ve had the pleasure to work with big names in the industry such as Nike ,Diesel, Adidas, Reebok, Jay-Z / Live Nation,Louis Vuitton Moet Hennessy, K2, Ecko Unltd, Johnson & Johnson and many more.

2. Your work is pretty unique and full of creativity. Where does your inspiration come from?

It mainly comes from Music and the artists that I've got around me, aswell as everything I see. You have to always keep your eyes open on everything as you would never know when something would inspire you, so the important thing is to watch out for inspiration.

3. Could you describe for us your typical 'start to finish' workflow when working on a design?

I think it would be me brainstorming ideas first, then directly starting from scratch in Illustrator and visualizing my ideas. Later on I move it all into Photoshop and finalize it, sometimes I additionally draw elements later in Illustrator to keep adding them to the main Illustration that is being finished in Photoshop at that moment. Also I draw a lot stuff with Graphite/Ink, which I scan in, "retouch" and work into the composition.

4. What are your tools of the trade, both hardware and software?

My tools of the trade are usually mainly Illustrator/Photoshop, but sometimes I need to get those pencils out and draw elements, I just love that playful look they give when combining them with digital work, it just gives such a fresh effect that makes it look way more interesting than just a pure digital illustration.

5. What, for you personally are the pros and cons of being a designer?

Pro's : If you're lucky you have the opportunities to work with the people you look up to, like musicians or similiar, you might get to see your tee-shirts being sold at big stores near you, which gives you a decent level of pride on your own work.Also, you might get hired by an agency outside of your country, so that you can gain expirience , e.g learning the country's language, socialize with people etc etc...It's much fun to see yourself succeed, it gives you the power to aim for more.

I have been featured in publications such as Computer Arts,IDN Magazine, Advanced Photoshop UK & FR, Beautiful Decay, Pilot Magazine, Digital Arts and showcased in Exhibitions such as the Maxalot Galery Time & Space Exhibition, Diesel Only the Brave New York and Miami Launch Parties. and at the Gorker Gallery/Semi Permanent in the Exhibition Lyrics & Type.

6. How does your job as an artist and designer influence your life? Do you feel that you see things around you differently for example?

There are definitely things going a different way now! You see most of the things with different eyes now, for example, before I started doing Illustrations/Graphic Design/etc. I was loving all those ad's people did for the industry and it's clients, but nowadays they look way more different than before to me, in a negative way most of the time. And when you try to explain your friends e.g what is looking wrong on something they think you're crazy, haha. You got a whole new feeling to the things you see around you, you ain't getting impressed as easy as before anymore as your taste for the look of things gets more and more expirienced and better, so that you judge things not in the same way as before.

7. What are your coming projects?

I currently work on a series of Illustrations for Nike football, which will be available in 2011, a few tee-shirts aswell for nike but to be sold at the Footlocker 's in Europe, aswell as 3 tee-shirts for Lamar Odom's Clothing label " Rich Soil " and more secret stuff is in progress... Really became productive in the last quarter of the year, the busy part started this time at the end of the year for me. Expect some interesting projects in 2010 from me, until then, stay tuned.

8. What are your favourite 5 websites, and why?

www.cpluv.com www.thisis50.com www.kanyeuniversecity www.twitter.com www.behance.net Easy, thisis50.com & Kanye universecity because of the news about Rap / Hiphop / Gossip etc, and why those 2 Blog's? Kanye is my favorite Rapper and 50's blog is the funniest one I know! Behance & Twitter : Simple, communicating. Spreading the word about you and your work, keep people updated, also get in touch faster with friends etc, things like that. Computerlove - Favorite blog about art & design, it's the one I peep most of the time, still waiting for it to relaunch, hope it's soon.

9. Once again , thank you very much for the interview. As a final word, do you have any tips for upcoming artists and designers?

Never stop to AIM, aim higher everytime you reached a goal. Aim for the highest, so that the other things won't be that hard to reach compared to that big goal. And if you got to the point that you reached your biggest goal, just keep going like that. Simple. Thanks a lot for the opportunity!

Where to find him

http://www.behance.net/aureax - Behance account http://iammago.com/ - Website & portfolio twitter.com/iammago/ - Please add him on Twitter

More work of this artist