In this case, John Holcroft creates thought-provoking illustrations that touch on various hidden realities. From our addiction to social media to child labor, John finds a way to convey strong messages through a single image. The artist’s sharp commentary on contemporary issues has caught the attention of 113K people on Instagram, as well as of prestigious entities like the BBC and The Economist. Without further ado, we invite you to scroll down to immerse yourself in these eye-catching artworks and uncover the layers of meaning that lie beneath the surface. More info: johnholcroft.com | Facebook | Instagram | Etsy First of all, John told us how he chooses which issues to tackle in his illustrations. “Primarily I am a freelance illustrator who is trying to make a living, in order to showcase my work I have to produce some illustrations to showcase my work. Art editors are looking for illustrators who can convey text by the medium of an illustration and I have to base my concepts on typical subjects that I might get in a job, however, I must also make the subject universally understandable and illustrate things that resonate with most people,” explained John. “Commissions from clients are always going to be more challenging because you have specific criteria to meet, unlike the freedom you have when creating promotional work. What is important is the style has to be recognized as mine. Clients can sometimes throw curve balls during a commission in the form of a last-minute request that can compromise the whole piece, however, it’s my job to either tell them why it won’t work or try to make it work,” replied John. “I don’t read comments very often and I believe people have a right to an opinion. Most of my work out there are commissions to serve the purpose of making a story more understandable regardless of my views. When I create promotional work, I can’t incorporate everyone’s views, I can only base them on my own,” wrote John. “I think young people are more likely to react to images they’ve seen, especially strong conceptual images that will get them thinking and questioning. Those people will be running governments in the future and if my work, can plant a seed of an idea along with thousands of other illustrators’ work then I believe it can only be a good thing,” replied John. And lastly, John added: “One major issue that is blighting freelancers everywhere is AI. I don’t know if those using platforms like Midjourney are aware but this is killing off illustration in much the same way streaming services are killing off music. The arts is a multi-billion dollar industry that is being taken over by these platforms. It is happening slowly enough that you won’t notice until one day an art director wants to commission a real human illustrator because they’re bored of the bland, samey, unconceptual images AI spews out for free but there won’t be many around because it’s no longer viable to be a freelance illustrator. This isn’t me over-acting, this is happening unless we legislate against AI companies being allowed to copy illustration styles and take elements from illustrators’ work. People think I must be financially ok, but the truth is, up till two years ago, I had a nice income and gradually my regular clients vanished and I’ve had very little work so I’m living off savings. After 28 years of hard work, I may have to stop being an illustrator and re-train to do something else. This is the hard reality and it’s because of a handful of greedy companies being allowed to develop software that basically makes people like me redundant. I want to change this behavior and get the commissioner to abandon this abhorrent software and commission real illustrators.” Follow Bored Panda on Google News! Follow us on Flipboard.com/@boredpanda! Please use high-res photos without watermarks Ooops! Your image is too large, maximum file size is 8 MB.
