Veerle's blog

It's always a pleasure when I can introduce a fellow countryman. Meet Pieter Van Eenoge.

Hi, my name is Pieter Van Eenoge, born in 1976, I’m a fulltime freelance illustrator and live in Bruges, Belgium with my girlfriend, 2 sons and 2 cats.

I like the way Pieter plays with perspective and how he sometimes distorts and exaggerates depth and dimension. You get the feeling you're stuck in between in a two and three dimensional space. He loves to use black, still his color palette is always well balanced. A lot of his illustrations have this vitality, dynamism, energy with a twist of humor that I really love.

Did you always know you wanted to be an illustrator and did it take long until you had your personal style?

No, I didn’t, but I discovered pretty early that I could draw a bit better than most people. I wanted to become an engineer, that way I could draw bridges and machines. An illustrator was something I never heard of. Then I went to art school to become a graphic designer and ended up graduating as an illustrator. Maybe it is my destiny… ;-)

It is still hard for me to believe I have a personal style. Ok, every artist has a unique way of building an illustration or even a popsong, but there is always that shipload of influences that controls a part of the creative process. In art school I discovered underground comics and psychedelic poster design from the 1960’s. Robert Crumb and Henriette Valium were my heroes and crosshatching was all I did. Then Ever Meulen became my teacher and at the end of the 1990’s Chris Ware was the big next thing, so my style became very Klare Lijn or Ligne Claire. Over the years I experimented with pencils, paints and papers, and only now I have the feeling my style is becoming personal. It took me 10 years…

Which of your projects are you the most proud of? And why?

Last year I made a series of bookmarks that I wanted to be published. Instead of contacting every possible publishing house or postcard company, I talked to the people of Stichting Lezen and convinced them of using the bookmarks as a new year greeting card for their 3000 ‘friends’. This way I got paid quite well and 3000 interesting people and/or have seen my illustrations and maybe use them as bookmarks.

Big deal, you say? Listen to this: I had the idea for these bookmarks 6 or 7 years ago, made a lot of sketches and had them all stuffed in a backpack that I took to the Pukkelpop festival. My girlfriend and I had a great time, but when we came back to the the camping ground, not only our tent was gone, but everything in it as well. Goodbye clothes, goodbye sleeping bags and goodbye sketches. Some asshole(s) stole everything we didn’t wear that day, and it was hot as hell. Staying up all night in shorts and a t-shirt, pissed off and cold, not my idea of fun. …We never went back to the Pukkelpop festival.

Did the Internet influence your work or helped you in any way?

Thanks to the internet:

• I discovered a lot of great illustrators like Jeffrey Fisher or Gary Kelley.
• I can easily promote my work abroad.
• I found an agent in the UK.
• Chris Curry from the New Yorker mailed me to let me know she liked my work
• It’s a lot faster to look for a picture of a belle époque bookcase
• I’m on this webpage…

How do you typically come up with a concept for a new illustration?

I learned that a lot of things happen on paper by coincidence. Sometimes I can see the whole illustration in my head, but usually I start with some very small roughs, maybe 4 cm high, and deal with ideas and composition. Mostly the size or placement of an object or character can lead to new ideas. Or I start drawing characters interacting with each-other. I even made some nice illustrations thanks to mistakes and erased parts.

What do you do to recharge your creative batteries?

I used to have the same feeling when I played in a band and went to a concert, but sometimes when I go see an exhibition of really great beauty, there is that moment where I’m not looking anymore, but want to leave as quickly as possible and start working. Then I know my creative batteries are recharged. I try to reach that level with everything I look at.

More examples on Pieter Van Eenoge's website Analog Catalog.