Photo courtesy of Billy Baldus
Milwaukee artist Billy Baldus
Milwaukee’s Billy Baldus has quite the repertoire of creative interests and designed covers for the Shepherd Express in the early ‘00s. Off the Cuff talked with him about his many talents in the artistic realm.
Describe your artistic journey over the years.
A very busy adventure with many late nights, piles of sketches and lots of big ideas—some of them really good and some of them not so good. As you mentioned, one of my first commercial art gigs was illustrating covers for Shepherd Express. I did about 15 covers. That was way back around 2003. It was a great experience. I don’t even remember how that came about ... a cold call I think! It was really cool to see random people holding up the Shepherd Express with my art on it. In between then and now I’ve done a wide range of creative work for design and marketing agencies, museums, manufacturers, toy companies, big corporations, an opera company, universities, hospitals, a few ma and pa shops, the entertainment industry, and my own fine art.
Do you work strictly on a computer for your artistic creations these days? Please elaborate on that.
A computer is always involved in the work I do, but it’s not the only tool I use. When it comes to an illustration, animation, branding and even web design, I almost always start with a sketch on paper. With illustration, I usually complete the final drawing on paper. Most often, I’ll do the inking by hand as well using Sumi ink and a brush. When I am using the computer, I always have my Wacom tablets handy. I create all my fine art pieces with screen printing in mind. Halftone patterns are amazing. I use a lot of different tricks in Photoshop to create halftone patterns. Those are those little dot patterns that you see. It’s a way to make gradients and textures while only using one color.
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Do you work for someone else, or are you an independent artist? Or both?
I’d say both. I’m a self-employed designer so I do work for clients, but I also do fine art, and that’s my independent artist type work. Recently I’ve teamed up with seventyseven and we’ve created some great work together. For my independent artist work, I am planning on having more gallery shows and spending more time focused on my fine art.
Give a few examples of some of the projects you have done.
I did art for the Florentine Opera. There were billboards all around the city sporting the artwork. I illustrated and animated a series of commercials for Horicon Bank that featured a hip otter and cool goose talking in the swamp. I helped create the Trowel Challenge video game for Wacker Neuson. I created graphics at Discovery World, look out for the invasive species! I worked as the art director for ETE REMAN, a manufacturer in the automotive after-market, and created a ton of fun, wacky marketing and branding materials for them including a marketing flyer that doubled as a paper airplane and a stand. I helped re-brand Goodwin, a large law firm headquartered in Boston. One of my favorite gigs is the UWM Panther Film Tees which I design every year for graduating film students. And recently I helped create a cool series of Zines for seventyseven featuring wild illustrations and fun design.
Do you have favorite types of projects, or do you love everything equally?
I enjoy the wide range of work that I do. Web and print design, animation and motion graphics, branding, wireframes, producing and video editing, writing and photo editing. But my favorite type of work is illustration. I love bringing ideas to life in an exciting visual way. I especially love poster design. It’s a perfect combination of design, typography and illustration.
You’ve come a long way in your career. What is the most important thing that got you where you are today?
Good question! Black tea, a supportive family, and staying up super late playing video games as a kid…that taught me how to focus with little sleep!
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