Posted a commission on ArtStation for a header #5

On By Jon UreñaIn Arte

Welcome to yet another instance of me mentioning several artists by name, and potentially annoying them. You should already know what this is about: I posted a job listing on ArtStation because I wanted someone talented to replace the awful AI-generated header of my site with something I would love to stare at every day for years to come.

The style I’m searching for is somewhere between the following examples, belonging to the portfolios of some of the artists who have offered themselves: 1 – 2 – 3 – 4 – 5 – 6 – 7

Sadly none of the following artists match what I’m searching for style-wise.

  • Lina Russo (portfolio): I’m very fond of her drawings, but wrong style for what I want.
  • Gianpiero Mangialardi (site): a tremendous pro that apparently has produced covers for dozens of books. I’m very impressed with his stuff. Wrong style, though.
  • Loan Art (portfolio): huge talent, very unique stuff. Same thing.
  • Out Class (site): a collective of talented pros. They have pointed out two artists in particular, specialized in comic book styles, but that’s not quite what I’m looking for.
  • Diya Sengupta (instagram): very talented artist with an extremely unique style. I like it a lot, yet…
  • Alejo Vigliani (portfolio): fantastic work that would do great for hard-boiled, grungy projects. Mine’s not one of them, though.
  • Michelangelo Di Gregorio (portfolio): I’m impressed by his stuff, and I appreciate that he’s from Rome (the old Rome would have continued to exist, if I had any say in it). He approaches the anxious, loopy vibe I was going for, but not quite as well as the examples above do for me.
  • Kamilla Egri (portfolio): I like her drawings in general, particularly her use of colors. Not comparable to the drawings I’ve put as examples, though.
  • Adrian Merchan (portfolio): an interesting style, but not what I want.

Nobody else has applied so far; maybe the onslaught of emails will slow down to the point that closing the job listing will make sense.

A curious detail I’ve come across: after informing some artists that their style didn’t match what I was looking for, some of them were eager to try and mimic those other styles. Is that something that visual artists actually enjoy doing? As a writer, if someone suggested that I should change my artistic voice to match what they prefer, I’d be tempted to tell them to eat a dick. Maybe visual artists are more adventurous.