Featured Artist: Renaud Garnier

My Background: born in France, I was raised in a design studio, playing with markers and Letraset press types as my father is a respected designer. Educated at the National visual school of LA CAMBRE in Brussels, Belgium. After 10 years of design in Europe I decided to move to California, thanks to the green card lottery. Beginning as an Illustrator (oil pastels), I got passionnate about japanese brush style illustrations, symbols and logos. I’ve founded a design studio in a loft in Emeryville and became an art director for a bio tech company (corporate design) and am specializing in logos, corporate identities and packaging from food to the cosmetic industry.

My Technique: Illustration: oil pastels and brush with black ink. Design: although there is no software for ideas, I do use illustrator, photoshop, and quark.

My involvement with the Guild: 3 years member, thanks to my neighbor and friend Rachel Perls (thank you).

Favorite client story: My first job in the U.S. Freshly arrived from Europe, I was trying to settle down in my new life, as well as watching my 8 month old. My wife’s boss really insisted on re-designing his logo, in spite of the fact that I was not ready to work. I accepted the project. On my laptop (which could barely fit the table of the sublet) I created his
logo during my baby’s nap. As Illustrator was not installed, I had to do it in quark which forced me to do something very simple. The final artwork was made through the internet, by a friend 10,000 miles from us. The client loved it and accepted the first proposal directly, KISS THAT FROG, his business is a French import company specializing in ceramics and children's cartoon licences (like BABAR). I was honored the year after to receive an award in PRINT’s regional design annual for this logo! Thanks to that I had my work published in a Japanese book about WORLD LOGOS...

All artwork © 2003 Renaud Garnier. Not to be used without permission.