THE INTERVIEW R
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Did you always want to be an artist or did you have other interests when you were younger that you wanted to pursue? In my teenage years, my favourite magazine was ‘The Saturday Evening Post’ and I remember enjoying the illustrations for the articles done by artists like Norman Rockwell etc. What is your technical background (where) - college, art school, university? I subsequently attended the Johannesburg Art School in South Africa. However, on completion of my course, I was offered a job at J. Walter Thompson as an Assistant Art Director. I tried it and enjoyed it and thereafter spent a number of years in advertising, progressing to Creative Director (McCann Eriksson) and also in an Accounts and Marketing Executive position. I retained an interest in illustration throughout and decided I would enjoy life more as an illustrator. South Africa proved to have limited opportunities for illustrators. I had come to admire the work of English illustrators like Michael English, Alan Aldridge and Philip Castle. I therefore decided to move to London. With my experience in advertising, I chose to work mainly for advertising agencies
How did you first get involved with the Athena poster company? In the early 80’s (I think), I was approached by Athena, whose major areas of activity was printing reproductions of classical art works and the French Impressionists. These sales were limited because one print was bought and hung up for years, hence restricting market expansion. I suggested that a larger market, plus repeat sales, were more likely if we appealed to a younger market. It was the Punk era which I found quite exciting but a bit crude. I thought about how an Italian designer would handle it. The result was the brightly coloured and well-defined eyes, lips and hair. I enhanced these with an emotional tug at the heart - tears, kisses etc., etc. I thought that the teenage market would be the best and I tried to appeal to them by making the look ‘aspirational’. Did the ideas for your most famous posters (The Kiss Series and Hollywood diner) just come to you or were they inspired by something in particular? On the Hollywood diner. The actor I most clearly identified with at that time was James Dean. The actor I admired most was
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Marlon Brando. My favourite singer was Elvis Presley and the woman I held most in awe was Marilyn Monroe. I tried to imagine how wonderful it would be if I were in a Hollywood diner with all four of them; hence the illustration .
How long did these images take you to create? The most successful ‘Kiss’ series, I executed in a month or two. What is your favourite picture/poster that you have created? My two favourite illustrations (of mine) are Long Distance Kiss and Three Girls and a Gun. What made you first try airbrushing over photographs? The style of illustration I preferred was airbrush; that is doing an original drawing, cutting masks and spraying the appropriate colours to build up a realistic and clearly defined illustration. The photographic feel I developed after working for many years in advertising directing photographers like Sam Haskins. There came a period when computers became very sophisticated and I worked out a way of achieving a similar airbrush effect using Photoshop. My method was to take my own photographs and adapting and stylising them by using a similar masking method and colouring individual colours with each mask. This made life a lot easier.
Athena was established in 1964, founded by Ole Christiansen. It came into being at a time when pop artists such as Andy Warhol and Roy Lichtenstein were creating works that were influenced by consumer packaging (remember Warhol’s Campbell’s Soup and Coca Cola bottles and Lichtenstein’s ‘Wham’?). Athena really came into its own when it expanded its operation from reproducing fine art reproduction prints into poster manufacturing. In 1977, they produced the ‘Tennis Girl’, the massively famous poster of the knickerless girl in white tennis clothes and in the 80’s ‘Man and Baby’ (L’Enfant). At this time, the new techniques of airbrushing photographs started to become fashionable and the next success for Athena followed in the early 1980s with dreamy, fantasy images such as A Dolphin Moon and Unicorn Princess and Syd Brak’s iconic ‘Kiss Series’.
INSIDE ATHENA
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Who is your favourite artist? The photographer I admired the most was Richard Avedon and later, Annie Liebowitz. Are you satisfied with what you have done so far in your career or would you like to do more? I am comparatively satisfied with my career. It has kept me happy for many years.
What are you doing now? At present, I have limited my output and seem to do mainly 1940 pin up girls for clients in America. (Syd has done work for companies including Coca Cola, MSN, and Levi’s.)
What has been the biggest moment of your life so far? Probably the proudest moment in my career was when I was given an award by Bill Bernbach, who I have always considered the best communicator that ever was. (Syd was awarded the ‘gold award’ for design and illustration in Johannesburg, South Africa by Bill Bernbach in the mid-1970s.) www.sydbrak.co.uk
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