AD 32 - Artist research - David DeGrand

David DeGrand may be one of my new favorite illustrators, I chose him because we have a similar way of drawing people, we both like to exaggerate features and make everything look a little disgusting. We also use similar shading techniques and our line qualities share similar traits, a perfect inspiration for me really. I also chose David because his client list is pretty marvelous to look at and it also has some clients that I would like to work for Including Nickelodeon and Walt Disney Television Animation. DeGrand has also landed clients such as MTV, Spongebob Comics and YUCK! magazine.

David's style is extremely cartoon and has an alternative feel to it, his work is a little gross and disgusting yet it is delivered in a socially acceptable way. He uses outrageous colour palates that are easy on the eyes but give the image that WOW factor to great effect. There is a lot of sketchbook work and from looking at the quality of line id say that he scans in original artwork and then colours it digitally. It's heavily based on character design but the lines and colours lend his work out to be used in comic books and cartoon ads.

David makes a lot of indie comics and higher caliper comics, there are a lot of kids books and design for cartoons in his portfolio. Id say his main audience would be aimed towards a younger generation but some of his comics fit into a slightly older catagory of maybe 18 -25 year old's.
So to sum that up he is an indie cartoonist who has a broad range of work aimed at the younger generation whilst still keeping the interest of people my age with a passion for all things gross.

David worked on a series of books called The Zombie Chasers and I would have liked to have worked on the dust jacket for one of them, it looks really busy and featured a load of characters on the cover, that would have been heaven for me to work on something like that.

I found David through a promotional website called Illustrationmundo which is a site dedicated to artists and their work, it's essentially a catalogue for illustrators and designers. The site lead me to his actual website which is really nicely set out, he also has a Facebook presence and a blog. His online space is pretty well managed and he has appeared at many art shows including Naughty Nineties, the end of an era, Cartoon Funanza and Seduction of the Idiots. Pretty much every art show he had attended was local to his home state Texas but the numbers were pretty impressive as he has appeared in around 23 local shows so far.


I couldn't really see if David works on commissions as there was no evidence on any of his sites, His main portfolio site did include a load of personal work though so id imagine if he had enough time on his hands to work on personal things he might have some room for commissions.

Speaking of personal work, David has a book of his own artwork published by Milk Shadow Books and a lot of his personal characters have been made into stickers that you can buy online.

It seems like David is busy but has enough time to work on his own things which he also makes a living from, I looked at some interviews with him and there was no indication to a regular job. David has illustrated for Spongebob comics for the past two years and is also a contributor to Heeby Jeeby Comix so it seems like he sustains himself by jumping between these two jobs and selling his personal work online.