marketeer, usabilitist, typonaut, designer, podcaster, ex-drummer, father of two and self-proclaimed comic artist.
What a mouthful.
History
I was born in Germany between anno and domini as the youngest son of my considerably older father, living ever since unremittingly.
My holy trinity is: design, technology and music. And I wanted it all. I started drawing comics in kindergarten, had my first computer when I was 12 and started making music at the same age, but finally got my first drum-set at the age of 16 (before I tried the acoustic guitar and piano).
Design
Irretrievably spoiled by the consumption of too many comic books at a very young age (European comics, that is), all I can remember from my early childhood was me holding a pen and drawing comics—or whatever you call the primordial stages of that in kindergarten. I wanted to become a comic artist, but never had the guts to really go for it. This unanswered yearning for creativity somehow got me into the “Vorkurs” at the Schule für Gestaltung, Basel, where I learnt to my surprise that there indeed are drawing utensils other than a biro.
Music
During that period I grew myself far too long hair, a beard and an ego, all as provisions for becoming a pro drummer (I was quite indecisive whether music or the fine arts were to be my vocation). Anyway my drumming career was swiftly dismissed after realising that only the lead-guitar players got all the girls.
Technology
I finally found a way to combine technology and design by becoming intellectual and graduating as a typographer in Freiburg.
A list of my past & present computers: Commodore 64, Amiga 1000, Amiga 1200, some cheesy PC with an AMD 486DX2 80 MHz CPU (first DOS & Win 3.1, later Novell DOS then OS/2 Warp), Macintosh Performa 6200, PowerMac 7600 (running System 7.5-9, then Mk Linux, “PPC Linux” and OS X 10.2), PowerBook Ti 15”, PowerBook Al 17”, MacBook Pro 15” (3,1) running OS X 10.5 and Ubuntu Linux.
In 1997 I somehow ended up in Tokyo, being terribly creative producing TV commercials, videos, CD-ROMs several Web sites and some print material.
Currently I am working for a major international ad agency in Tokyo.
I used to do a weekly podcast, Kilians Podkost, in German about living and working in Japan. Due to lack of time it soon turned into a monthly and then once-in-a-blue-moon podcast.
Here and elsewhere
I am more or less active in several social network thingamajigs, so if you really can’t help it, do go ahead and take a look: flickr, twitter, Last.fm, facebook, asoboo
Some of my favourite comic artists from the top of my head:
Gotlib, Franquin, Uderzo, Tabary, Maëster, Jean Giraud, F. Ibáñez, Gilbert Shelton, Gerhard Seyfried, Daniel Ryba. As you can see two lonely German artists at the end, one of which has given up making comics decades ago. That’s how desperate the situation about comic art in Germany is.
Ah, yes and I cannot pay enough tribute to Wilhelm Busch, who’s works were probably the first “comics” I ever read, because my grandmother used to have a copy of Max und Moritz, which I read over and over.
About my comics and sketches
When I find the time between making online comics, I sometimes post some works as entries for Illustration Friday, or I just put any random doodles in my sketchbook.
All the published artwork on this website can be shared under the following cryptic license:
Creative Commons: Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 2.1 Japan.
This gives you the right to share whatever comics you find on this site with your friends, under the condition that you make clear it is my work (and not e.g. yours or public domain), and that you do share it with exactly the same terms as I did. You are not allowed to make any commercial use of the artwork from this site and you are also not allowed to make your own episodes of Shadywoods (using my characters). I am aware this sounds restrictive, but I’d like to keep control of my characters for now. Please understand that. Don’t forget you’re free to share these comics with anyone as long as you let them share alike.
