Friday, December 04, 2009

Mentors


Respect. Wonderful to receive, important to give. Always take time to give advise and encouragement. And don't be afraid to ask for it either.

I've always been a fan of great color, of concept artists like Mary Blair (who, besides her wonderful art and illustrations, did color design for several Disney projects). One of my favorite color designer/illustrator/artists out there right now is Lou Romano. Lou worked on The Powerpuff Girls, Iron Giant, Monsters Inc., The Incredibles, Cars, and has done some voice work, including the lead character Linguini in Ratatouille.

I wrote to Lou Romano last year asking about his gouache work. As busy as he must be, he wrote me back. He gave me advise and encouragement and I was thrilled to have corresponded with a hero of mine. Who are your heroes? Write them. Be sincere and respectful and you may find that they write you back.

I have received a few emails from artists asking my own advise. I am always very flattered - I feel like a work in progress at its early stages myself. But I always write back and do my best to give what advise and encouragement I can. I also host this blog for the same reason. We should all support each other, regardless of skill, knowledge and experience. What matters most is passion.

Check out this lovely bit of correspondence. A 13-year-old aspiring illustrator by the name of Howard Cruse (who became an award-winning graphic novelist) wrote to Dr. Seuss and got a beautiful reply. 26 years later he wrote again, and again got a wonderful reply.

Keep up the good work, artists.

2 comments:

Dudel said...

Thank you for the redirect, Mike. :)

Josh (musarter) said...

This is really great. I sure could have used encouragement of that caliber. Thanks for sharing.