Illustrator Joshua Huisenga and DK’s Akira Morita teamed up as artist and art director for the fall poster for Blitz. Read more about Blitz, the Capitol Hill Art Walk.

Design Kompany first noticed Joshua’s work on a pole outside of the Little Theatre on 19th Avenue last spring.

This is the design Akira and Joshua arrived at:

DK: Tell us your impressions of Blitz and Capitol Hill.

JH: Blitz is a very new thing here in Seattle, but the organizers are already making efforts to keep the promotion of the event new and fresh. Style, artist, and even the Blitz logo is reinterpreted for each application. Fun!

I have strong impressions of Capitol Hill. I live at the top, so no matter where I go, I always have to go uphill to get back home. That was just one concept in one word association list on one of many pages full of illegible doodles. But it made it all the way to the end. It was merged with the far-out mix of people, fashion, lifestyle to end up as you see it.

I love drawing pictures like these, with a million little lines and details. The late hours, sheets and sheets of tracing paper, finger cramps, and pile of eraser dust to get from a scribbled word in a list to finished piece is completely worth it.

DK: What was it like working with Design Kompany as art director?

JH: Working with Akira was pretty smooth. He started me off with a short list of mostly fall words and said “Go.” We had a few conversations and reviews along the way, pulling in the full Blitz crew when appropriate, and he seemed to have the right questions and suggestions at the right times to make great improvements—”let’s try above AND underground,” “can we see more neighborhood?” and “it’s ok if he’s a giant.” This all led to the densely illustrated, diagonally-sliceable posters you’ll see around the neighborhood.

DK: What did you like about this project?

JH: Getting to redraw the Blitz logo to fit the illustration style of the rest of the poster. My clients never let me do that. The shoes—I want a pair. Drawing the neighborhood. Tiny little cars and buildings and crosswalks. Even tiny manhole covers and storm drains. I was smiling the whole time.

DK: Any challenges?

JH: One big challenge was the schedule. Both Akira and I were traveling at one time or another during the project, and we didn’t have a lot of time to begin with. This meant lots of evenings filled with pens, pencils, and tracing paper. But we got it printed, sliced and delivered before the October event.

A sliceable poster means it obviously needs to work as two pieces, but also as one. All the relevant details had to be in there twice—on both halves of the poster, and it was a challenge to make it still work as a single without looking awful.

DK: Anything else you’d like to say?

JH: Thanks to DK for inviting me in on the project. It was a fun one.

You can get in touch with Josh at:

Joshua Huisenga
Chalkbox Creative
www.chalkboxstudio.com