Kristina Suvorova

Any hilarious stories about you as a kid being creative?

Since I remember myself - I was always bored of the ordinary things around me. I had such an urge to create my own world, so I would come up with all these ideas how to give more character to my furniture, room, clothes or anything that was surrounding me and that was more less in my possession.

So, one day I called my grandpa and asked him to come to visit me and bring his chainsaw with him. I explained it to him, after he was curious WHY the chainsaw, that I wanna cut my wardrobe in half, paint it with different bright colours and make a little chiller bed on the top of it. You know, for reading or taking naps and stuff ? This project worked out fantastic ! At the end and I was very proud of my ‘chillers wardrobe’ invention. I also cut two pair of jeans in half when I was 10 and sew a brand new kinda ‘frankensteinish’ pair of jeans with two different halfs. My mum was not so impressed though. So yeah, things like that, quite often.

What are some of the best and worse parts of your job, day-to-day.

The best is, that I do what I really love and what makes sense for me in my life. I get to know amazing people trough the different projects. I have a chance to learn new stuff all the time, to see things from many different perspectives. The worse (or more of the challenging part) is to make it work constantly, to make living out of it and keep a healthy balance between creative/artistic and business mind.

What’s the best piece of advice you’ve ever received?

Easy, but always effective - Don’t give up. At the end if it truly matters to you, fight for it and stand up so many times as you fall.

How did you develop your style as an illustrator and what tips would you have for others?

Everything was learning by doing. Now when I look back, I understand that the most important thing was(and still is) to try out a lot. I was drawing like crazy. Hills of drawings and sketches. Trying out new materials, new colour combinations, new shapes and styles. Mixing everything together and at the end sorting things out. Keeping the favourite parts, elements, impressions, topics and leaving out things that didn’t mattered anymore. Developing your illustration style comes together with the development of your own personality. These two things are very connected to me. Also the certain routines are necessary. It’s like doing sports somehow, if I don’t draw or create for too long - I’m loosing the ‘shape’ a bit of the whole thing. The creative muscle gets numb.