Podcast #02 feat. Gijs Vanhee & Seba Quick about the universal symbols in their art

Belgian muralist and illustrator Gijs Vanhee meets the Swedish visual and tattoo artist Sebastian Quick in a conversation about the universal meaning of symbols and how they integrate them into their art.

Nomads and travelers for long periods of their lives, the two artists find many similarities in their approach to creating their art - whether it's on canvas, wall or human body. 

Gijs Vanhee is an illustrator from Mechelen, Belgium. He arrived in Bulgaria on 18 July 2022 at the invitation of Visionary to paint a mural in the centre of Sofia. Already in his teenage years, Gijs developed his curiosity and passion for painting and graffiti. Now he is an active artist of the street art scene in Europe, who with his interesting characters develop whole stories on walls of urban space, paper, canvas and digital.

Narrative drawings in which humans with the head of a bird play a leading role. The search for freedom forms the common thread throughout his work, as well as the balance between nature and society. His works are an invitation to take time to stop and look around, to search in the details for stories or questions about us humans or how we are drifted away from who we are. His drawings have a very recognizable style, often in black and white or with limited use of color. With murals, the elements or textures present usually play an important role in the work. This visual language becomes a recognizable style in black and white that speaks loudly on crucial topics that people, preoccupied with the "important" matters of their daily lives, neglect.

Sebastian Quick is an old fellow of Visionary, a tattooist, illustrator and muralist. Seba currently lives and works between Sweden and Bulgaria, and hopes to be part of the creative scene in Sofia more and more often, seeing his belonging in a certain way to our latitudes. 

More photos and video of the process of creating the Parked Life mural by Gijs Vanhee HERE.

Photos: Mihaela Draganova
Sound recording and editing: Rosen Pavlov
Recorded in Tonstudio2.

Visionary Talks #02 is realized with the financial support of the National Culture Fund - One-year grant program - 2021 as part of Visionary - One year art program 2022.