Twelve young and talented participants at this year’s landmark 20th ArtCamp in Pilsen chose the Illustration – The Creative Process course, led by Bosnian illustrator and graphic designer Dejan Slavuljica, head of the Department of Graphic Design at the Academy of Fine Arts in Sarajevo. In the interview, he explains why he believes the creative process is at least as important as the final image, how illustration can transcend space and time, and why curiosity and a willingness to act remain the most important skills for young artists in the age of artificial intelligence.
You’re both an illustrator and a graphic designer. Do you see these as two different ways of thinking, or do they naturally complement each other?
Actually, yes, I’m a graphic designer and illustrator. If I look back, I was first an illustrator, then a graphic designer, and then an illustrator again. If we look back at the history of art, we see that it’s almost the same thing, with differences in some details, and people start to give names to those differences. So if you look at historical examples, you’ll find many elements that are the same across graphic design, illustration, and art.
Related to this post
Your ArtCamp course is called Illustration – The Creative Process. Why did you decide to focus on the process rather than the finished image?
I’m going to appreciate the process to the end of my days because it is the most important thing, and it’s what drives every creative man to do something. If we ever finish the project, we immediately start working on another project or another visual, whatever. So, especially these days, with this AI threat, we need the process because making stuff gives us purpose.
One of the key ideas in your workshop is exploring space and time in illustration. Could you explain what those concepts mean in your own practice?
To explain these questions, you should be present at my workshops. But I’m joking. Exploring time and space through illustration, at first it’s my, let’s say, experiment to go outside of a two-dimensional picture. Because of illustrations, people usually see only a two-dimensional picture in a book or on the wall. But it’s much more of that. And there are, again, many examples that show us that illustration can live across different media and in different ways in a 3D world. So exploring the time and space could sound a little strange. But it’s actually my attempt to push students more to think about illustration and their drawing, to ask themselves what they can do to go outside the box and make something new, something special, something interesting, and so on.
You also encourage participants to develop ideas under time pressure. Why can limitations sometimes make us more creative?
Yes, I try to encourage them to show them that they have a possibility and all the skills they need to finish the project on time, because in my time, while I’m teaching, I saw that many students don’t have self-confidence, and that’s why they never finish, or they avoid some projects because they think they can’t finish on time. I push them harder to ensure that they can do any task in today’s world.
You’ve taught students for many years. Have you noticed that today’s young illustrators approach creativity differently from previous generations?
Yes, I noticed many differences because the world today is slightly different from it was 10 or 20 years ago. There are many gadgets and symbols of the modern world, and we have too many options to choose from. Still, the more options we have, the less we use them. Actually, I used to teach my students that the only option to do things is action, or reaction to something immediately, to take a project and do it, think about it, and finish it. Still, today, technology has given us many options, and while we play with those options, we lose time and don’t finish our project on time.
What do you hope participants will still remember from your workshop a year from now?
I hope they will remember me or this workshop, at least because I tried to show them how to connect things in the process of thinking or making the visuals. Because that’s the most important thing, if they can connect some thoughts from history to a project they are working on at that moment. So if they remember some dialogue with me, I will be happy to help them in that moment if they have some trouble with creativity.
This year, ArtCamp offers 41 courses led by top artists, many of whom travel from abroad regularly.
“Thanks to the cooperation established within the EUPeace Alliance, we’re already selecting projects and activities that will connect our artists and students. Hosting teachers from the Academy of Fine Arts in Sarajevo at ArtCamp is the first step. We’re also preparing a series of workshops led by Sutnar Faculty teachers in Sarajevo, followed by workshops given by Sarajevo artists for our students in Pilsen,” added ArtCamp’s executive director Lenka Kodýtková.
