Awesome Artists We’ve Found Around The Net: Grzegorz Domaradzki

December 4th 2021, 12:00pm

For years, Awesome Art We’ve Found Around The Net has been about two things only – awesome art and the artists that create it. With that in mind, we thought why not take the first week of the month to showcase these awesome artists even more? Welcome to “Awesome Artist We’ve Found Around The Net.” In this column, we are focusing on one artist and the awesome art that they create, whether they be amateur, up and coming, or well established. The goal is to uncover these artists so even more people become familiar with them. We ask these artists a few questions to see their origins, influences, and more. If you are an awesome artist or know someone that should be featured, feel free to contact me at any time at [email protected].This month we are very pleased to bring you the awesome art of…

Grzegorz “GABZ” Domaradzki

Grzegorz Domaradzki, aka ”Gabz” is a graphic designer, creator of posters and illustrations, art, and cinema enthusiast. He graduated from the Academy of Fine Arts in Poznan, Poland where he lives and creates. He is married and is the proud father of his baby daughter Zuza.

After receiving his MA degree, he devoted himself to illustration and computer graphics. At first, he worked for several advertising agencies, thus, gaining the experience necessary to start working as a freelancer, which he has been doing since 2005.

Apart from illustrations, Gabz has been creating alternative posters for various blockbusters of world cinematography. His screen prints decorate the houses of collectors all over the world, and his work has gained a large group of dedicated fans. He has presented his works at many foreign exhibitions, and his group of clients includes Marvel Studios, Warner Bros, 20th Century Fox, Paramount Pictures, and various other global brands.

His works are characterised by academic skills, sense of colour, attention to composition and detail. Gabz is no stranger to traditional tools (pencils, ink and paint), but he also tries to fully use the potential of the latest technology by frequently combining traditional drawing with computer processing and by creating fully digital graphics often adorned with custom typography.

JOBLO: What got you started as an artist?
GABZ: Well, first of all, I’ve been drawing all my life pretty much. I started extremely early with comics, later got my academic education (at the Academy of Fine arts in Poznan/Poland) and after graduation, I’ve spent a few months working for advertising agencies where I had my first experiences with digital illustration and graphic design. I rather quickly discovered it wasn’t for me and turned freelance around 2005. From there my so-called career took off: First I had to combine commercial work (storyboards, portrait, and illustration) with personal works only to later fully commit to poster related artworks, editorial illustration, and game art luckily on my own terms. Haven’t looked back since.

Who were some of your favorite artists growing up?
Back in my young and teenage years, I was obsessed with everything comic and graphic novel related, with legends such as Moebius, Enki Bilal, Milo Manara among many others; later during art studies, I fell in love with masters such as Albrecht Durer, Hans Holbein, Johannes Vermeer or Caravaggio and later moved towards Egon Schiele, Francis Bacon, Lucian Freud, and Anzelm Kiefer among many other painters and sculptors I admire to this day.

Who do you really dig these days, follow on Instagram?
Instagram is great for following artists and designers I admire and to see what other fellow creatives are producing. I’m always blown away by the level of detail and overall disturbing visual language of Jeremy Enecio for example. I’m in awe of James Jean’s versatility and creativeness. I also recently re-discovered the work of Michael Whelan – amazing color and composition skills. Last but not least I have to mention a few of my fellow poster artists, who’s work are super inspiring and who constantly push me to deliver better work myself: Vania Zouravliov, Killian Eng, Tomer Hanuka, Akiko Stehrenberger, Greg Ruth, Rory Kurtz, Ghostco, my brother Krzysztof and so, so many others.

What advice would you have for budding artists today?
In short, don’t give up, work hard, experiment, and improve your skills constantly. Invest some of your time and skill in creating an online portfolio (tip: possibly limited to your best work only – post and publish work you’re willing and will be happy to create in the future) whether it’s a personal website or a profile on an existing creative platform such as behance.net for example. Don’t avoid social media (though we all need to be careful with those) since those can be extremely helpful in boosting your confidence levels, getting recognized, and building a fan base for your future work.

What should we be looking out for from you in the future?
Quite honestly it seems the future has never been as uncertain or unpredictable as it seems now, but as far as my work goes I got some exciting projects planned for the near and more distant future. Currently working on a “Man on fire” poster for a group of fans of Denzel Washington and the movie, I also hope to be releasing a poster print for Dennis Villeneuve’s “Dune” before the end of this year – finger’s crossed. I might tackle another Marvel movie soon as well. Apart from those few, I’m expecting my first NFTs and some new game related key art to be revealed and released fairly soon.

Being a fansite, we have to ask you… What are some of your favorite movies/TV shows of all time?
I consider myself a movie geek, so there’s a huge number of titles I hold dear to my heart: “Apocalypse Now”, “Unforgiven”, “Blade Runner”, “Boogie Nights”, “Memento”, “The Mission”, “Alien”, “Se7en” to name just a few. Happy to have worked on posters prints for some of them. Probably not super original but “The Sopranos” was and remains my favorite TV show of all time. I also enjoyed watching Allan Ball’s “Six feet under” back then too. From more recent shows I guess I’ll mention “Breaking Bad” and the absolutely mind-blowing mini-series “Chernobyl”.

Scroll down to check out some of our favorite art pieces from Gabz as we continue to follow his journey across his Website and social media hubs: Instagram / Facebook / Behance / LinkedIn / Store

Alien