Magomed Dovjenko

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.

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.

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.

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!]

 http://abduzeedo.com/interview-illustrator-magomed-dovjenko

I like is style of melting type and images and his use of more abstract shapes. I feel at times the work is similar to Si Scott's with a more liquid look. I feel the whole use of the inky look and type is something which has interested me i think mainly because it lets you play more with type rather than just the kerning.