Today we’d like to introduce you to Erik Casillas.
Alright, so thank you so much for sharing your story and insight with our readers. To kick things off, can you tell us a bit about how you got started?
Well, I started drawing in grade school to get attention. It was always something I could do to separate myself from the herd so to speak. Used it to get out of doing work in school and used it similarly all through high school. My first paying job was illustrating a brochure for my Chemistry teacher. Paid $50.
After that, I started sending art to radio stations because I was really into all of my music heroes and really wanted to get into that space. Over the years I did ads for local businesses and people that I knew as well as flyers for fraternities ( the frats seemed to have endless budgets and were down to let me have fun with their projects) I ended up doing a lot of work for an LA based radio station, KNAC, where I learned about timelines and deadlines and changing art to fit a client’s vision etc. Again, the fun part was they gave me guidance, but left me to do what I wanted creatively.
I moved to San Diego in 1986 and learned that you can be an artist as a profession, but companies had Art Directors. That became what I had my sight set on. I found a home in the sportswear industry starting out with a small brand called Life’s a Beach, Bad Boy Club leading to my 20 year stint at a brand called No Fear, half of those years at the artistic helm. Some people may find some of my ideas tucked away in the back of their dad’s closet. We did tee shirts as fast as we could come up with them. It was a place where my art as well as other ideas, got published regularly and were set free into the world to end up on the backs of a lot of people. While I was there, I still pursued side work in the music space. I did some illustration work for Britney Spears, Duran Duran, Sponge and I did some editorial illustration for Gene Simmons’ magazine at the time, TONGUE. Then there was MÖTLEY CRÜE. Having been a fan since high school, getting the opportunity to work with them was a project that I was just super stoked to get. Over the years I have done merch for them but it was the two album covers that were definite highlights for me. I got those in right as the music industry was leaving vinyl for CDs so I was just able to get to see my art on a full size LP complete with liner notes. The trajectory of the side jobs I would get after that were definitely cooler than before and I went on to do a few record covers for other bands.
After No Fear ended, I found myself revisiting the skateboard industry. I always thought it was a step cooler than doing tee shirts because when you were done, you had this substantial product with your art on it and it seemed so much more “permanent” than a tee graphic in addition to being for the most part, all about the illustration. My time at the skate brand DGK was such a great time because I rediscovered the most basic part of what I do, and that was the illustration. I will always remember it as a reset button creatively for me. I’m very proud of the five years of illustration I did during my time there. From there I went to the cannabis industry and was the art director for a brand named FLAV. Interesting world…kind of the wild west since it was so young and a little surreal, but creatively, I was allowed to do what I wanted on the packaging and the overall look of the brand. That industry, being a little volatile , my time was limited to five years but it was a good five years creatively.
That leads me to the present where I am the art director for a manufacturer that deals with licensed product on clothing where I manage a team of creatives as well as still get to do art. I like working with other people’s IP and brands and help steer them creatively into some cool places. I still do side work as long as it doesn’t overlap with what I am doing in my 9-5 and it is fun.. I have worked with HUDL brewery out of Las Vegas where they tell me the name of a beer and any interesting details about it , and I give them a finished label, I rarely have to do any major changes so the end result is usually exactly ( or very close) to what my initial vision was. Again, it’s the clients that let me kinda do what I want that are the most appealing. I’m not delusional, I realize this is a business and more specifically their business, but I still like doing what I want creatively. Over the past 35 years, no matter where I was working full time, there have been logos…hundreds of logos from very corporate companies ( PENSKE ) to baseball teams to a lot of breweries. I love doing logos and my logos are always rooted in illustration. I do love seeing my logos out in the wild. This is a very condensed snapshot of what I have been busy with since I started the whole art for the sake of commerce journey, and hopefully not too disjointed of an accounting of it.
I donate a fair amount of my time to local organizations like high schools and little leagues or other youth athletics clubs that may not have access or budgets to get very decent work done for them. I still have some things I would like to get done with my illustration, the main one being a children’s book. I have illustrated one before, but I have my own that I have written that I would like to get finished. It’s always going to be important to me to have a brass ring to reach for and for a while, this has been the shiniest one in front of me.
I’m sure it wasn’t obstacle-free, but would you say the journey has been fairly smooth so far?
It hasn’t always been smooth in the sense that it doesn’t always go the way you want it, but having said that, I have been very fortunate and made really great relationships and tried to cultivate them. I like that interaction part of it too and I think it’s important. I’ve dealt with very talented people that aren’t very pleasant to deal with. I never wanted to be viewed that way. There are a lot of challenges when you are selling something that many people don’t put a high value on. To a lot of people, art is the last class they had on a Friday when they were in grade school. Alot of time they figure if it is something I enjoy doing, is it really work? That sometimes trickles into not paying me or using it after they gave it to someone else and then stating “Well it was my idea and I had the other artist change it at least 25% so it’s not really yours anymore” and other various dumb things. I’ve always represented myself so I am the one that has to set the price and all the stuff that goes down before I even put pencil to paper and I don’t love that part. Historically, I probably don’t charge enough, but sometimes, I don’t want someone else to do the job especially if it seems like something that’s going to be fun. Probably not the greatest quality when you’re in business to do it, but it still has to be something I am excited about and sometimes, there has been projects that I would have totally done for free because I could tell they were going to be so much fun.
As you know, we’re big fans of you and your work. For our readers who might not be as familiar what can you tell them about what you do?
I’m not sure if it is what I “specialize” in per se’, but the way I work is kind of unique. I draw everything first. 75% of it is blue pencil on paper. I love the feel of the paper. I like smudging the graphite. I like erasing. I like drawing things and then putting a sheet of paper on top and then redrawing it over and over until it feels ready. Sometimes I will do a pre-drawing on my tablet, but for the most part, I do it all outside of the computer. I then import it into Adobe Illustrator. About 95% of what I do is all vector based and after 30 years of being in Adobe Illustrator, I know how to get it to do what I am thinking ( even though I do it the hard way ..I rely on some of my younger employees to enlighten me on some of the advancements in the program!). Also, I do everything with a mouse. I have tried the stylus, and while I sometimes use it to do the pre-drawing on my tablet, all finished art is 100% created by mouse. If you look at some of the illustrations I do, There are a lot of mouse clicks. One of the images I sent for the article, the Nikki Sixx collage, has over 250k clicks. I guess if I step back and think about it, it is a little unorthodox of a way to do it, but I don’t see it changing anytime soon. As far as the look, I just always wanted my illustrations to be a better version of what I was doing as a kid. I want them to be colorful and bold and I try and hide visual jokes in there when I can. I just want them to be good.
Can you talk to us a bit about happiness and what makes you happy?
Hmmmm…lots of things make me happy. I actually have the word “HAPPY” tattooed on the back of my neck. I love JEOPARDY, and Tarantino movies and my Playstaion 5. I love my family and my cat and I’m terrible at taking vacations because I really do love working. Going to concerts is my absolute happy place. When to my first concert in 1978 and it is just something I love to do. As happiness applies to my work, well I know something is turning out the way I want it to, when I go in my office, hours after I worked on it to just look at it again. That makes me happy. I make a lot of gifts and when people get them and love them, that makes me happy. I love having a new tattoo but absolutely hate getting a new tattoo. Sushi makes me happy and sushi that someone else is paying for makes me even happier. Making people laugh makes me happy. I’m a pretty simple guy and and very in tune with the things that make me happy. On my right hand, my knuckles have “DRAW” tattooed on them. At the end of the day, I love to draw.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.bluebellystudios.com
- Instagram: @bluebellystudios
