Between Creativity and AI
When it came to the new motifs for our homepage, you focused on a very fundamental topic: the creative process. What thoughts went into the illustration ideas?
Questions like: Where am I in the creative process? At what point does the new arise? And how do the tools I use influence my visual worlds? Since the emergence of generative AI in the creative industry, I have asked myself these questions a lot. If you run use prompt based motif ideas, are you still the master of your own creative process or are you more of a curator of other people's imagination?
So it's also about the influence of AI on creative work. Please take us with you through your header motifs, which aspects did you want to portray and which details were particularly important to you?
On the one hand, there is the feeling of being able to intuitively convert the images in your head into real illustrations using tools; on the other hand, working with the intermediate AI entity. She is shown here as another head that absorbs and translates information. The question is who else is responsible for the final output in this illustration on the right: who is the tool here and who is the craftsman?
How has your creative process changed through AI?
First of all, it's only changed in the sense that I'm more concerned with my own work process and the topic of AI. In principle, I always try to be open to new things, but I also see the ethical and legal questions that have not yet been clarified and the dangers that AI brings with it. Above all, I don't want to give up the cornerstones of my creative process.
With these motifs you tried something new stylistically. How did this come about?
If a project offers the opportunity to try new things and break out of your own comfort zone, then I like to take advantage of it. With the header images, I quickly realised that I couldn't get the mood I wanted with a pure flat style. So I became a little more abstract and, for example, converted the heads into highly stylised outlines.
The scenes work heavily with symbolism. How do you decide how realistic or abstract an illustration should be?
There are two levers: style and content. I can make the style more realistic or more abstract, the content more concrete or more symbolic. What the right mix is depends on the respective project or topic. With icons, infographics and portraits, recognisability is clearly in the foreground. For abstract topics or if you want to appeal to emotions with the illustration, stronger symbolism and a more abstract approach may be more appropriate.
Finally, a few personal questions: What drives you as an illustrator?
The challenge of capturing a mood with the language of illustration, getting to the heart of a topic, creating attention or generating emotions. Creating visual worlds is an incredibly exciting and satisfying process!
What are your goals as an illustrator? What projects would you like to realise in the future?
To continue to develop and bring my illustrations to many different media - covers, walls, basketball courts, trainers, ceramics, tapestries, the outer skin of a high-speed train ...
