Artists’ Sketchbooks 010: Kaveri Gopalakrishnan

Who?

Kaveri Gopalakrishnan is an independent comic artist based in Bangalore. She is an alumni of Animation Film Design from NID, Ahmedabad and also works as an Art Director for children’s books and animated short films, as well as an illustrator for a publication.

Tell us a little about your work and artistic practice.

After NID I worked as in-house Lead Designer at Chumbak for a year: I dived right into freelancing as an illustrator in 2013 (my first projects were the official comic for the Aadhar scheme, a mascot for a 'life coach' and a children’s book cover!) and began publishing my own web comics alongside.

Currently, I'm releasing my first graphic novel 'Two' (authored by Örjan Persson and Paro Anand for Scholastic India) and co-developing graphic narrative projects with the Kadak Collective along with a couple other illustrated covers.

My practice involves working with myself, day-in and day-out. I work with, am hired by, and (more recently) do hire consultants based on how much bandwidth I have on a particular project. It's important to know how much I can do myself and what someone else can do better/faster! (like graphic design and flash animation for example) I really enjoy the challenges of developing written and educational content along with the aesthetics of illustration and comic art. It feels like my brain works a little more well-roundedly, than when it did earlier as a freelance illustrator. I work as much by hand, as possible.

What does your sketchbook mean to you?
My sketchbook keeps me grounded! I end up writing notes and drawing on a daily basis, rather than worry about 'keeping a sketchbook and filling it up'. It's a practice that began in NID and that I continue today. A couple days without drawing and you get rusty, you forget how to capture motion, your drawing doesn’t communicate or match with what you're thinking in your head.

I draw most freely in in the wee hours of the morning: sleep isn't my best friend and I'm a bit of a night owl. That special period of 1-2 am is a stress buster, or it's first thing in the morning when I've dreamt something very odd and inexplicable. and I really don't want to get into client calls and my inbox just yet.

Could you share one piece from your sketchbook that means something to you. Please share an image and tell us a little about why you've chosen it.

I drew this late at night; I was getting very restless and had taken on way too much with work. The past 10 months (this was in August I think) had been back-to-back projects and most nights, I'd fall asleep not knowing whether I was really sleeping or not: it was just a tumbling kind of feeling, in and out. I use brush pens for my drawing, and it's incredibly satisfying, almost meditative. Materials are not too important for me, communicating is. I guess being a bit sleep-deprived made me really get into this 'zone' : I remember feeling a bit sulky about people who say "Oh, I live to sleep" or "I can just sleep anywhere!" I woke up very refreshed the morning after I drew this, though! Surprisingly.