Featured Artist: Isabel Samaras

My Background: I was born in NYC, and got a BFA from Parsons School of Design in NYC. The Rotten Apple will always be a part of me but I am currently making San Francisco my home. I originally went to art school to study printmaking but as it turned out Parsons didn't have a print major, so I somewhat arbitrarily chose Illustration (it seemed fairly well rounded - you got drawing, painting and printmaking classes). By the time I was in my junior year tho', Illustration seemed incredibly restrictive and I started taking classes in the Fine Art dept. Weeks after graduating I landed an illustration job for a William Morrow book on Japanese seafood called 'An Ocean of Flavor' (by Elizabeth And oh, an excellent cook and swell human being). It was a great job, paid fabulously and as soon as I was finished I took off to Italy for a month. After steeping myself in Italian culture and art for four weeks I didn't want to be an illustrator anymore! I came home determined to work with my own ideas, which I've been doing for some time now. Every once in a while someone would ask to use one of my pieces for a rock poster or magazine. That led to more direct illustration work and the funny thing is that in a bizarre circular way I've come back into the illustration fold in the last few years and find myself doing (and enjoying) more and more of it.

My Technique: I try to keep the paintings and illustration separate by using two different styles (this is also practical -- the paintings are incredibly time consuming, best reserved for long lead times and juicy budgets, rarely suitable for most illustration jobs). Most of the illustration work is done in two stages -- an ink drawing on scratchboard (scratchboard gives me a lot of leeway as far as giving the line character and making little noodley changes), which is then scanned into the computer and colored in Photoshop. I like the combination of the two mediums together because the hand drawing "humanizes" the end product a bit.

My involvement with the Guild: I'm a very efficient envelope stuffing and stamping machine for Guild mailings, and saucy raffle girl for Guild events.

My Favorite Client story: My favorite client story was more of an ongoing relationship with a now-defunct web magazine called gettingit.com. They had a wonderful "We're game for anything" attitude about illustration, paid really well, and the articles were *always* informative (if sometimes a little alarming). Previous to that, I'd never heard of men lighting their genitals on fire for kicks.

Other info you'd like to share: I really benefit from being in a little illustration "cauldron" here in SF -- several of my friends are illustrators (as well as my better half, Marcos Sorensen, without who's critical eye a lot of my work would be dimensionally warped). It's great to be able to fax a sketch over to someone and get a little feedback and thanks to modern technology none of us ever leave our studios anymore, which is why I sometimes to refer to myself as a troll or an art gnome.
In an act of shameless self promotion and an attempt to remain financially solvent I'd also like to mention that everyone should own a copy of "Devil Babe's Big Book of Fun!", a rainy day activity book for twisted grown-ups. Folks can order it from my site (if you want it autographed, go to the source!) or Amazon.com, or pick it up in various book and record stores.

All artwork © 2002 Isabel Samaras. Not to be used without permission.