Street art, product design, press drawing or fun visuals for advertising, the joyous and colourful illustrations created by Dutch artist Rick Berkelmans aka Hedof unfold through several disciplines. Universal, funny and childish, his characters live inside abstract landscapes where different shades are mixed to shape sparkling works.
The illustrator has collaborated for renowned companies such as Nike, The New York Times, Nickelodeon, Ikea, Samsung, KLM Airlines, Nestle, Playstation, Snapchat, WeTransfer, Google, Greenpeace and Facebook.
«In fact, I think as kids we all are super creative but are taught not to be when you grow older. In my case, since I was always the guy playing outside, building crazy stuff, playing with my food, and of course drawing a lot, I knew that when I would grow up, I want to be a drawer of some kind. So after a childhood filled with fun things like skateboarding and graffiti, and a boring four years at art school, I was finally ready to be an illustrator, he says.
Nowadays, with almost a decade of experience under my belt, I try to look for inspiration in everything around me, songs, movies, weird books, quotes on the train, I just make a quick picture with my phone, so I will remember it later and write all of this down in a book. Also, I try to draw random fun stuff at least 30 minutes a day and keep all those drawings neatly organized into folders. When I need to come up with ideas, I look at both my drawings and words and try to combine them into something new that is exciting. This can be for a new client project, or for a self-initiated screen print. I just want to keep creating and busy because it makes me feel happy and alive.»
