2 Illustrator Josh Evans Under The Spotlight

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Illustrator Josh Evans, located in Los Angeles, has a very unique style. He feels that his art work has a lot in common with alchemy and can't live without a pen, paper and a coffee machine. Lets have a chat with him!

TSD.Welcome to Think Smart Blog Josh, It's great to have you here!. Would you introduce yourself and tell us more about your art and what made you become an illustrator?

Hi, My name is Josh Evans. I’m a life long resident of beautiful Southern California. I recently graduated from Art Center College of Design from Illustration department. I live upstairs from a coffee shop and find myself in between work sketching the hipsters hanging out downstairs.

The processes and phenomena of being a human animal inspire me. I’m not super sure how this translates to my work but I feel like art work has a lot in common with alchemy and that there isn’t a clear path between your ideas of the work and the work itself. I came to illustration as sort of bargain between making a living and making artwork. I think it’s very important that a society uses good art and design in all levels of society and not to be placed at some unattainable level. That and I like to draw things.



TSD.Your illustrations have great color combination. What inspires you when creating them?

Man I’m not sure. It might have a lot to do with the environment I live in. Living in Los Angeles there’s a lot of Earth Tones and brightly hued colored buildings. I notice colors I use a lot of earthy reds, yellow ochers which are colors that I tend to wear often.


TSD. Is there anything you are currently working on we should look up to in the future?

Yes, I’m working on a book cover for this company Small Desk Press called Monster Party. It’s going to be super rad.



TSD. Is it difficult to be recognized and respected as an artist ?

I think it is. There are more and more talented people out there trying very hard to get recognized. But at least with the internet it’s easy to get a website up and spread the word about your work.


TSD. What do you feel are the most important skills for an Illustrator to have/develop?

I think it’s important to let whatever personality or tastes you have totally show through to your work. I’m not sure if that’s really a skill but I think it’s important to have.


TSD. Do you think it's important to use social network to promote your art such as:(flickr, twitter and facebook )

Certainly. Almost any way you can get people to see your work is good.



TSD.What is the one lesson that you learned the hard

way that you wish someone had told you about when you got started doing Illustrations?

A few times I have done work trying to cater too much to what I thought the client wanted. The end result would probably turn out better if I had been more myself. I think that’s something I wish I had known.



TSD.Who would you consider to be the biggest illustrator that inspired on your career?

I’d have to say R. Crumb. I saw the Crumb documentary as a teenager and was super inspired by it. Here was a guy like me who couldn’t relate to society, and made a life of drawing and drawing all the time. I thought that was super cool.

TSD.What are your favorite tools you couldn’t live without? ( pen/paper, online etc…)

Pen and paper definitely. And or a coffee machine.

TSD.What piece of advice you would like to give to new illustrators out there?

Well I’m technically a new illustrator too, but what I heard this quote from somewhere. The best publicity is great work seen often. I think that’s probably true.



TSD.Where can we find you online?

You can find me on mrjoshevans.com and at mrjevans.blogspot.com

Thanks for having me!