LIVE, The Edge NZ

Winter 2011

Feature & Interview

Soho Cool

New York based illustrator, designer, and art director Sara Blake visits Auckland this August to speak at the inaugural We Can Create design conference. Sarah Illingworth met the pint-sized artist at one of her favourite Soho cafés.

I met Sara Blake at a hole-in-the-wall café in a quiet part of Soho, right across the street from her old apartment. A simultaneously unassuming yet striking presence, Blake is approached throughout our interview both by folks who recognise her from the neighborhood, and strangers who just want to enquire her about her impressive collection of tattoos. 

She's tiny, incredibly sweet and incredibly talented—and incredibly motivated. Having put in some serious hours since she started working as an illustrator and designer in 2005, all the sleepless nights and long days are finally paying off. After selling out her first-ever solo show—at Sydney's Friends of Leon Gallery—last September, Blake was able to quit her full-time job as an art director and claim control of her schedule.

Though she still freelanced on commercial jobs, and continues to work around the clock, Blake says she has more or less struck a balance between the worlds of fine art and commercial design. That her career happens to also be her passion goes a long way toward keeping her so relentlessly diligent when it comes to getting the job done, whether the job is for another party, or herself.

"I'm really liking the freelance grind," she elaborates. "You know, working 12-hour days for a certain amount of time. And then you get to fully immerse yourself in art, too. I think they inform each other too, in weird ways."

After studying art and writing at NYU's Gallatin School of Individualized Study, Blake "fell into" working as a production artist for Engine Three, a boutique digital agency that focuses on website and digtial solutions for fashion photographers, designers, artists, musicians, and modeling agencies. After joining them straight out of college as an intern, Blake taught herself Adobe Suite, realising in the process that the illustration work she'd loved doing since childhood could be enhanced by the digital skills she was now acquiring, and turned into a career as well.

"I grew up thinking that I wanted to do art, but no one ever told me that illustration was a job—it seemed so far-fetched to me," says Blake. Now, she adds, "I can't really feel like I've finished something until I've scanned it and coloured it on the computer. But, it always feels really the best when you're just drawing. Listening to music, got your headphones on, just zoning out, drawing."

And so, following her time at Engine Three, the seeds for Blake's career in interactive design were well and truly planted, and it didn't take long before she was picked up to work as an art director by various agencies. In 2007, Blake decided to officially merge her fine art background and her digital work and started her own small illustration studio called ZSO (pronounced 'zo'). Her commercial work has included jobs for a wide range of clients, including Nike, Marc Jacobs and TED.

Drafted as one of the speakers at the inaugural We Can Create event at Auckland's Aotea Centre this August—a two-day conference co-hosted by local communications agency The Church for those interested in the creative industries —Blake has many pearls to offer other artists who are attempting to also straddle the worlds of fine art and commercial art.

She's one of the impressiuve line-up of creatives who are booked to speak at the event, including Eike Koenig of Berlin design studio Hort, Engin Celikbas of Amsterdam start-up agency KesselsKramer and San Francisco-based graphic artist Frank Kozik.

Touted as an annual celebration of all things art and design, We Can Create is a must for anyone working in a creative field.