Illustrating the Creative Process with Koldo Barroso

Koldo Barroso is a Spanish illustrator and storyteller who moved to the US in 2008 with a suitcase full of grotesque characters, dark stories and impossible visions. He describes his world of Art and Illusion as a mere act of “making visible and invisible world of magic, mystery and imagination.” His latest published work is a series of illustrations for Judy Dyble’s “Talking With Strangers”, the latest CD album from the legendary singer of Fairport Convention.

Koldo Barroso spoke to me about his experience during the making of “Talking With Strangers” and answered a few key questions about the creative process in illustration and storytelling.

How important is research in storytelling and illustration?

I think it’s essential because without a certain dose of reality there is no credibility and then you can’t reach your audience emotionally. If you’re creating a story, it’s very important to do your homework first and be consistent about the little details because small details can say a lot on a subliminal level. Besides that, it has never been so easy to research as it is today, with the Internet.

This was the case of the “Harp Song” illustration that I did for Judy Dyble’s album “Talking With Strangers”. It’s the largest illustration in the album for a 20+ minute-long song that tells a story about the relationship of the singer with music throughout the years. The illustration is full of details and hidden imagery. The mutant monsters are inspired in three different musicians from Judy Dyble’s musical past, the most recognizable of them is guitarist Robert Fripp. There are also elements that resemble King Crimson’s masterpiece “In The Court Of The Crimson King”, since the song features a classic Crimsonesque part and the collaboration some members of the legendary band. So these details and small elements may not be noticeable at first sight but they create a concrete atmosphere, a concrete first sight feeling. This couldn’t have been possible without research and visual resources.

What comes first, the story or the image?

This is an interesting question. I guess it depends mostly of how visual or how narrative you are. In my case, I’m a visual person first and foremost. But mainly, it depends on the project. If it’s a commissioned project to illustrate a story by someone else’s text, obviously the text rules the work. But when I work for myself, the image always comes first. Then I sit in front of it and say: “tell me your story”.

Are emotions important in the creative process?

Emotions are the key of spiritual awareness because only through them we can tell when something is right or wrong. We feel good when we see a baby laughing and bad when they cry in pain. In the creative process, it’s just about the same. Through emotions, we can explore hidden parts of ourselves, let our ego go and be ready to find things that might be hurtful but necessary for us to heal the past.

This has a lot to do with the illustration I did for “Neverknowing”. It’s a beautiful song written by the producers of the album Tim Bowness of No-Man and Alistair Murphy and which is interpreted as the recovering of something precious that was long lost. The whole album has a lot to do with that encounter with the past so I used the brambles and thorns all over the illustrations as an analogy of the old abandoned memories that keep growing up in our within. They kind of protect us but, even if it’s harmful, one day we realize that we need to face them and clean them in order to advance.

Do tight specifications make the creative process harder?

I hear artists complaining about this all the time. Nobody likes to wear tight corsets while being creative! In my case, I think it has more to do with not trying to be someone else. That’s the kind of job I never accept. When someone wants me to do a drawing just like someone else or to do something that I know from my experience will never work. It’s a matter of being honest.

Besides that, I don’t think that tight specifications should narrow down freedom and creativity but the opposite, if the specifications make sense to make the cover the needs of the project. For me, it was pretty challenging to illustrate the song “Talking With Strangers” because the lyrics are very descriptive: a woman who spends a lot of her time with her Internet friends and her dogs require her attention and pleading her to come back to reality. John Hurford had already painted this same scene for the album cover, before I was invited to join the project, and of course he did a great job. So I decided to go a little further than the lyrics and the album cover. I envisioned a ship city crossing the sky, representing the strangers from the Internet world. It’s like taking the advantage of a narrow situation and take it to the limit, pretty fun!

What happens when the story to illustrate is too abstract to put into images?

This rarely happens when you’re illustrating children’s books and novels, but very often when I work for poetry and music. I love this kind of work because I can do a parallel journey and bring a new dimension to it. I thing it’s very interesting because this way people will have different versions of the concept. In this case: the music, the lyrics, and the illustration.

For the album, I had to illustrate the song “C’est La Vie,” whose lyrics were written by one my favorite lyricists, Peter Sinfield, he is famous for his work with King Crimson and Emerson, Lake and Palmer. The song is about a man who says to his lover that he can’t tell her how much he loves her, so they end up accepting the situation in resignation until the love fades away. I decided to create a story within the story and I saw in my mind this little scene of a woman and a rock by the sea. They’re in love but they won’t tell each other. The woman needs the rock because that’s where the lighthouse that will guide her in the night is, but they just accept the situation and part ways.

How to achieve the desired result?

In my experience, the only way to achieve the desired result is by not focusing on it. The process is the most important, not the result. To be open, to be true, to be honest, to be humble, to be ready to let go, to be authentic with my work. If all this happens, the result is always right.

When you focus on the result, you don’t allow creativity to happen truthfully, you close the door to infinite possibilities that may come to you. These possibilities are gifts that we should accept from life, being humble and playing with them, letting them happen without fear and restrictions. My only restriction about creativity and ideas is that I need to feel them true, I need to feel them authentic, that they’re really supposed to be. It’s kind of an instinctive thing. When I work this way, then I feel free.

So I’m not really concerned about seeing the final work if I know that the process was authentic. For instance, in the case of Judy Dyble’s album “Talking With Strangers”, I haven’t seen a copy of the CD yet but many people has told me that it looks great. If they enjoy what they see I think it’s because they’re tuning with the feeling that I experienced during the process. So I’m very happy that they can see the result, but my joy is first and foremost in the process.

Thank you Zoë for giving me this opportunity to talk about my experience and for sharing this experience with your readers.

Koldo’s present projects are a modern fairy tale for grown up readers and a sleeve design and illustration for Kimara Sajn forthcoming CD. His latest published work is a series of illustrations for Judy Dyble’s “Talking With Strangers”, the latest CD album from the legendary singer of Fairport Convention. The album, due to release in September in the US, was produced by Alistair Murphy and Tim Bowness of No-Man and it features the collaboration of renowned musicians from King Crimson, Pentangle, All About Eve and Fairport Convention.

You can visit Koldo at www.KoldoBarroso.com. At his web site, he hosts creativity workshops such as the Kooky Pets where readers contribute with crazy ideas to create new characters every week that he brings to life with his pen.