Ilias Kyriazis 07/16/2010
 
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Ilias Kyriazis one of my favorite young Greek comic artists surely doesn’t need a lengthy introduction as his brilliant work does all the talking. Here is what he shared with us in this week’s featured interview:

Hello Ilia and welcome to EyeCandies. Can you tell us when did your comics craze begun and what kept fueling your creativity over the years?

Hello Aphrodite, thanks for having me. Well... it wasn't much of conscious decision, I grew up in a comics-reading household, I loved reading them, I liked to draw... so it wasn’t long since I started drawing my own stories. Now I want to believe that I’d always create comics one way or another but the truth remains that I got lucky and got a job doing just that in “9” magazine.  After that it was much easier to ignore distractions and focus on something I liked since I was a kid.
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How would you describe your drawing technique/style?

Hm... I have a pretty traditional approach to comics: Pencils, then inks, then (mostly flat) coloring. I don’t find a reason to mess with the basics and I prefer to do all my experimenting on the storytelling and the structure  of the plot.

I always aim my comics to be clear and accessible.

What kind of themes inspire you to start a comic and where do you find inspiration?

I dunno... life? I don’t think many people have answered the age old “where do you get your ideas from” question in a satisfactory manner. Most of the times I see something and I ask “what if...” and from that comes a story.
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Manifesto is probably one of my favs. Can you share some info on this project?


It was a deeply personal comic and a learning experience. There were times when everything in my life seemed to revolve around it. At the moment I’m trying to distance myself from it, I’m not even looking at the volumes. I wanna focus on doing new stuff.
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What is your latest comic about?


As an artist I did the GHOSTBUSTERS: Displaced Aggression mini series http://iliaskyriazis.com/comics/ghostbusters-displaced-aggression/ that was written by Scott Lobdell and published by IDW that recently was collected in tpb. Very cool stuff, check it out ;).

I especially enjoyed the fact that it received such a warm welcome from the Ghostbusters fan community.

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As a writer/artist I completed the webcomic MELODY http://iliaskyriazis.com/comics/melody/ for DC / Zuda which may be my favorite comic I did in the last few years. It will soon be available for download for your iPads and iPhones and all that hi-tech stuff I know nothing about. I’ll post more info on my webpage in time.
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How do you see the comics scene evolving in Greece in general and what would you advice a young upcoming comic artist?

I don’t know... despite all the evidence to the contrary I choose to remain optimistic. The last 10 year I’ve taken part in hundreds of conversations about “the Greek comics scene” and what could be done to improve things etc and I’m kind of tired. I think the best thing one could do is focus on his/hers art and make the best comics he/she can and the rest will follow. And maybe the solution isn’t in Greece. Post-Internet it’s one world. Let’s just create cool comics and put them out there.

Also- dear young upcoming comic artist? DO THE WORK. Draw comics and not illustrations. And know that you’ll have to draw at least a couple of hundreds awful pages before you get to your first good one.
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Share your top 5 fav artists/designers

At the moment: Frank Quietly, J.H. Williams III, Olivier Coipel, Stuart Immonen, Jim Cheung. The list will be totally different in a day or two.

Use a comic strip to define your current mood

I’m not much of a comic strip person, I’m afraid. I like the Perry Bible Fellowshiphttp://pbfcomics.com/.

Your latest creative achievement is?

I’d say the whole “working in American comics” thing but it’s a work in progress. Too soon to tell.
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Can you give us a peak of your future plans?

I can tell you that there’s this graphic novel called “FALLING FOR LIONHEART”, it’s written and drawn by me and it’s coming out this fall from IDW. And that’s about all I can share at the moment. But it’s something I wanted to do for years and I’m very proud with the result and I hope people will like it.



LINKS: […]

- http://iliaskyriazis.com/
- http://iliaskyriazis.blogspot.com/

EMAIL: Iliaskrzs@yahoo.gr
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