Ed Booth

Ed Booth is an Art of Austin artist!

Ed Booth

AoA – How long have you been in Austin and how did you find your way here?

Ed – I’ve been in Austin for 22 years now. I moved here to attend the University of Texas and I’ve called Austin my home ever since.

AoA – When did you realize that you were an artist?

Ed – I’ve been drawing since I was very young. I remember getting a lot of encouragement in my art classes and my interest grew from there. I’m not sure there was a moment where I suddenly felt I was an artist but I was definitely the kid filling my notebook with sketches of airplanes and video game characters during class.

AoA – Can you speak to your art training?

Ed – I graduated from the University of Texas with a degree in Studio Art. For the past eleven years I’ve worked as a digital artist at Powerhouse Animation.

AoA – Where do you derive inspiration from?

Ed – I’ve been inspired by a lot of different mediums throughout the years. When I was younger it was science fiction movies and video games. In college I was inspired by a number of comic strip artists and I eventually created and maintained a webcomic for a number of years. These days I’m primarily inspired by other digital illustrators and graphic artists. I’m particularly interested in vector based illustration.

AoA – Can you tell us about what your work is concerned with?

Ed – Most of my illustration work is based on photos that I find compelling. I try to reconstruct the photo using simplified shapes and a limited palette. I distill each illustration down to its essential elements and filter out anything extraneous. My goal is to retain what attracted me to the photo in the first place and to add elements to make it as playful and approachable as possible.

AoA – Can you talk a little about your creative processes in creating?

Ed – I’m always on the lookout for reference photos that capture my interest. Sometimes I have a particular subject matter in mind that I would like to illustrate but in many cases I just stumble upon an interesting photo that grabs my attention and I fire up my computer and start plugging away.

AoA – Big question. What do you feel the role of art is in the world?

Ed – I think it’s different for every artist. Oh man, that’s such a cop out answer, isn’t it? I’m glad there are artists that can tackle big questions like that, but I’m not one of them. If I started dwelling on how art should function in the world I think I would be too afraid to start the next illustration. For me art becomes less intimidating when I approach it more as a craftsman and less so as an artist. A craftsman probably doesn’t get too hung up on how their work affects the world, they just hone their craft by doing something over and over and getting a little bit better each time. I’ve found that by approaching my work this way it takes a bit of the pressure off and makes it easier to get started on the next idea.

AoA – Who are some artists that you look to?

Ed – I’m a big fan of Shepard Fairey’s work. I’m also a big fan of local mural artist Mike Johnston. I admire a lot of other vector artists like Chris Rathbone, Mike Wrobel, Fernando Correa, and Andy Chipman to name a few.

AoA – If you could own 1 piece from a living artist, who would it be?

Ed – I’m gonna go with an original Calvin and Hobbes strip by Bill Watterson. You remember the one where Calvin creates a duplicate of himself and the duplicate professes his love to Susie and when word gets back to the real Calvin he has a complete meltdown? That one.

AoA – What else do you enjoy besides making art?

Ed – I’m a big retro video game nerd. I love playing and collecting old games for the consoles I enjoyed as a kid like the SNES and Genesis.

AoA – Where can we find your work? Do you have any shows planned for the future?

Ed – You can find my latest work on instagram @edbooth_art. You might have even seen some of my work plastered on a few electrical boxes around town… but there is really no way of knowing who did that and also vandalism is wrong.