Appreciating the person behind the art.

Welcome to UP-CLOSE, a small series of interviews offering an inside look at the life and the creative forces driving some of the world’s shining and rising stars in the field of illustration.

No matter what you do or what stage of your life you’re at, these interviews with creators, doers and rebels from all over the world are raw, emotional and full of truth.?

Hopefully they will spark you to create something new. We invite you come along and enjoy the ride with us. Let’s get UP-CLOSE with our first interview!

Episode 1.

– RICHARD A. CHANCE: United States / Brooklyn, NY / B: September 28

Richard A. Chance is an illustrator form Brooklyn NY with a peculiar sense of humour and a great personality that transcends his drawings, almost as if you could see him smile through them with a child-like ‘I got you!’ expression.?He grew up around the corner from the Chinese food spot near his house and as a kid, he loved running across the street to go to the deli to buy something for his mom. Many of his work can be seen in highly regarded publications such as Bloomberg Businessweek , Variety , Refinery29 and The New Yorker .

I got the pleasure to sit down and get UP-CLOSE with Richard this month who was more than willing to make a fun interview. I hope you enjoy it and take a moment to know more about the person behind the art.

UP-CLOSE: Hi Richard, hope you’re doing great today! We appreciate you taking time off your day to talk to us about your illustration practice. Could you tells us more about yourself, where you were born and who and what where your biggest influences when growing up?

Richard A. Chance: I was born in New Jersey and grew up in New York, Watched a lot of TV as a kid. Basic tv, if I don’t go to school I could watch people fake fight on Jerry Springer and learned a little bit about law from Judge Judy and Judge Mathis. Simpsons at prime time hours then Wrestling. A good diet of tv.

UC: How did those people and things you mention shaped your vision of the world?

RC: I don’t know, I guess me watching talk shows about real people and cartoons satirizing them was amusing to me, still is. If people watch, its fun, especially when someone looks over your shoulder and see you drawing a person and putting a word bubble above their head. It was a teacher, she was cool about it.?

UC: How did your upbringing and life experiences helped develop your personal tastes and love for illustration?

RC: I’m shit at academic stuff, so I decided to stop paying attention in class and draw instead. Or I was shit at paying attention then started to draw, who knows. It was an easy choice to become an illustrator, I already draw a lot, now I have to learn to fix problems with it. Seems way easy when I write it out. Personal style, the color palette is a desaturated version of the Rugrats, and the Simpsons with 4 shots of vaporwave. Then the shading was an airbrush style I liked in college, no one in particular I was into. It was cool, but not too cool, to like and listen to 80's music in college, the aesthetics came with it.

UC: How would you describe the type of work you do? We see a lot of colourful pastel themed illustrations with a three dimensional aspect to them. Do you consider this your trademark style and the one clients expect from you?

RC:When describing, I just say its pastel pink drawings. I like what I’m making, I still want it to evolve but not too much from what im doing. So in a way it's a bit of a trademark style of mines. I don’t know if I'll feel the same after 10 years though, might transition to a whole new thing. Clients do expect it but I mention that if you had your own color palette I can work it as well.?

UC: How important do you consider animating certain elements in your work?

RC: It’s only important if I cant get what im thinking out in one static image. It's another way for me to address the client’s problem they have.

UC: When did you start working in illustration and how was that very first experience for you?

RC: I started the moment I left college, a professor told me that it might take 5 years to get a regular rhythm in this field. For me, he was right, but, Im very fortunate that a self initiated project I was doing caught the eye of Giphy and it landed me some sick jobs. It was jobs I was scared to do, the art director thought I was doing this for a bit, I didn’t corrected them and act like I’ve been doing this for a long time. Actually it was an article about Linkedin, funny. Before that I was doing whatever I could get money for, small podcast, baby showers, friends beer. "Hey my friend have a “thing” he working on, Rich you can draw for it”.

UC: Do you have formal training in art or design?

RC: I went to New York City College of Technology, I went to become a IT guy, but grades, so I stayed in my school and switched majors to Graphic Design. So I went to school for Graphic Design, and had a few illustration classes as electives. Other than that, I watch videos and read books and try to teach myself.

UC: Could you tell us more about your process when approaching an illustration assignment? What’s your favourite part of the process?

RC: The Concept part the best part, depending on how much knowledge you have of the topic. After I get an assignment I try to remember a moment where I shared similar experience with the writer. Then doodle/sketch till I have a few ideas. If I don’t find the drawing amusing it goes to the bottom of the sketch pile. 3-5 ideas, idea 1st is my Banger, idea 2nd its cliche but still funny to me, and the 3rd idea its the wild card idea. Idea 3 gets picked more than the other two. One time I went all wild card ideas, half way through I forgot what the article was about. LOL had to start over.?

UC: How long do you spend developing an illustration on average?

RC: 8-10 hours after sketching, depends on how detailed or the deadline. I had really tight deadlines when I worked in house as an illustrator. Walk in at 9 or 10, im usually late but I still had an illustration to sketch and draw by EOD. Four hours was the quickest I’ve done and it was a mid detail drawing. 2 days if its complicated.

UC: What is the difference between the finished art and the first ideas you think of?

RC: I try to keep it as close as the idea or initial sketch, but it always move a bit. The faces aren’t the same, it came out nicely, but not how I envision it. I’m getting there, better than years before.

UC: We read a lot of captions or mini-stories on the illustrations you post on Instagram, often times unrelated to the image we’re seeing and in a very?stream of consciousness style. Could you tell us more about that and how it occurred to you?

RC: The mini stories at first was me trying to see if I'll get feedback for my drawings. People would write “good job”, or “I love this”. I remember a drawing of Sherlock Bones (it's a skeleton dressed like Sherlock Holmes with a little boner). I don’t remember the comment but it was saying something nice but my intent was to be gross. I realized nobody was actually looking or reading the captions. I deleted everything then started to write nonsense to see if I'll get the same response. I did get the same response ‘till a year later. Someone asked me if the stories of me were true, I said yes. The stories aren’t 100 percent real, 85 percent if anything. I don’t know what to write there, so I just write whatever comes to mind. One time a coworker who follows me asked me about a particular caption, she asked me, did I really did what I said I did in the captions. She laughed it off, but 85 percent of me was sweating.

UC: Do you remember the first thing you ever drew? What was it?

RC: I drew this triangle monster thing with 3 strands of hair in the back. I can draw it to this day. I remember me drawing it on a shipping barrel my mom had. The barrel was cardboard texture so you can write on it and put the recipients address on there, I draw all over it.?

UC: Do follow or admire other illustrators/artists? Who do you consider to be the best illustrator right now?

RC: Yeah, I follow mainly illustrators and artist. Who’s the best, I cant really say the best, it switches depending on what they going for. And I’m biased towards humorous/conceptual illustrations. Emiliano Ponzi, Karolis Strautniekas, and Yuko Shimizu they’re killing it, I think they are the best.

UC: How would you describe yourself to someone who doesn’t know anything about art or the illustration industry?

RC: I draw, but not comics. I don’t have beef with comics I love comics, but when describing illustration you have to mention that. Then a follow up would be, yeah for newspapers and stuff.

UC: What do you enjoy doing when you're not illustrating?

RC: I watch movies at theaters, I don’t care what it is. If its good then good, if its bad then I'll doze off and sleep, which is also good. But other than that, play video games, collect pens and feed stray cats. I’ve mistaken a rat for a cat one time, fun stuff, fun NY stuff.

UC: What’s the one thing or tool you can’t live without? Please expand on this we’d love to know!

RC: I’m legit looking around my apartment and I can’t see anything I won’t throw out. I read a book about minimalism, it was recommended to me after talking to a classmate. It was about reducing and getting rid of things you don’t need. I was some what all ready following this. When I was younger I had to put all my child hood possessions in storage for a year. All I had was clothes and when my family settled in our new place, I didn’t care about all my old stuff. I always assume that I have to be on the move. And having a bunch of stuff is gonna slow ya down. I went overseas with my laptop tablet and some clothes for 3 months. When I came back I got a new apartment with just my laptop, drawing tablet, and clothes. It’s been that way for years. At most maybe a few sketch books I write and draw in but I threw a bunch of them out a couple of months ago. I’m keeping some of them now, so my sketchbook might be the only thing I can't live without?

UC: Do you have any new challenges coming up in 2021?

RC: Every year I have a thing I do, like a resolution. Not resolution, but for lack of better words a resolution. The resolutions I make is more about social skills. Go out every weekend, talk to a few people that aren’t your friends, be vulnerable, shit like that. This year, I haven’t planned anything, we are all inside. It feeds the drawings. It's more easier to talk to the person than figuring out who they are from a far.?

UC: Finally, this is something we are asking all of our guests and our favourite question of all: What do you consider to be the most important thing in life?

RC: Family, family is everything. – Dom Toretto

For more on Richard, make sure to follow his work at:

https://richardachance.com

https://www.instagram.com/richchane/