Kristian Hammerstad is an atypical wowzers illustrator/designer hailing from Oslo, Norway. He went to school and worked in London a couple of years ago. His style combines rich color, exquisite detail, sensual form and morbidity. It pleases us like the powerful expression of a countenance without regular beauty. We’re fascinated by his illustration! His prints for various going-ons in his hood are absolutely a-ma-zing. He definitely brings the 1960’s illustration back–but in his own style. Here’s what he said to us:

1. What kind of materials/media do you use in designing?
I use a brush and ink on paper for all my drawings (after I have sketched them in blue or red pencil). I then use a computer to scan and color them in.

2. Your artworks are very bold yet colorful. Do you consciously plan the spatial arrangements and the use of color in your illustration, or do design and color flow naturally and unconsciously onto your work?
I very seldom do a rough sketch or layout of my drawings before I start on the real one, but I always have a pretty clear image in my head about how the drawing is going to look. I do however draw the text elements for posters on a separate paper, then I can move it around in the computer to find a good place for it. Coloring in on the computer can be a lenghty process, there’s so many choices! I try to make a choice quick and stick with it.

3. Can you tell us a little bit about the Lot Lot poster sets and inspiration process? Where the idea comes from and which kind of ideas do you want it to convey?
The Lot Lot posters were done together with a good friend of mine, Levi Bergqvist. The main thing we tried to do was to keep the theme of “Four” going through everything, as there were four different club nights. Other than that we just wanted them to look fun. They sort of sprung out from us being very different in the way we work; Levi is extremely methodical and logic, and I’m much more intuitive. Obviously he did the typographic elements and I the drawings. We also tried to keep these elements separate in a way, just simple type on top of an image/images.

4. Your art is very different to what we usually seen from Norwegian’ aesthetic. Also the colors choice and styles have very different way impact. So how does your art represented your country or city, and how can both interface?
I haven’t really thought of that. Maybe it’s beacuse most of my influences come from other things than design? I am very inspired by some Norwegian comic-book artists though; like Jason, Bendik Kaltenborn, Christopher Nielsen, Flu Hartberg. These all have their own very distinct style, more so than me, I think…  I also have a background in animation, maybe that helps.
I really don’t know how my art represents my country or city, other than perhaps a growing diversity here. I have this feeling that a lot is happening, that there’s sort of a generational shift in graphic design and illustration etc. Young people here know a lot more about things and have a lot more references than young people did ten years ago. People have been studying and working abroad and bring back fresh approaches. That’s really fantastic, because they will run the show in a couple of years.

5. Will or have you adapt your illustration into comic-book medium?
Perhaps at some point.