Q: Originally from the Golden State, what are some of your favorite things about living and working in Tinsel Town?

A: I’m originally from a small town in California’s Central Valley called Turlock. It’s mostly an agricultural community—lots of almonds, peaches, and cows. I moved to Los Angeles about ten years ago to attend Art Center College of Design.

My favorite thing about Los Angeles is that you can make anything here…seriously…anything! There is a section in North Hollywood where it’s all prop manufactures for the movie studios. I drive by this one place that is just an entire lot full of fake rocks. If you go downtown there is a screen-printing district, a fashion district, a jewelry district, there’s even a piñata district! I also love the food. Los Angeles is great for food!

Q: Do you keep a sketchbook? What is the balance between art you create on paper [or other analog medium] versus in the computer?

A: I keep several sketchbooks, and I like them to each have a purpose. I have one sketchbook that I use only for illustration sketches and notes. I like being able to repurpose previously unused sketches. I have another smaller book, that I can take anywhere and do anything I want in it. It’s my largest vehicle for experimentation, so I don’t rush through it. I’ve worked on the same sketchbook for a year or two before.

Working with pencil and paper is really important for my work. Digital provides so many options, so when I’m working on personal work, I like to go completely analog. I don’t erase anything, and I force myself to deal with the humanity of a drawing.

Southern Reach Trilogy Covers. Design by Charlotte Strick.

Q: What is the most important item in your studio?

A:  I have to say my Staedtler Lead Holder Pencil with HB Lead and a piece of paper. Early on in high school and college a lot of people tried to persuade me that architecture was the best way for me to draw and make money. They might have been right, but I switched majors from architecture to art within about three days of entering college. The only leftover from architecture is that I’ve always loved drawing with a lead holder pencil. I collect them. I tend to misplace them, so my wife has jars all over the house that she deposits them in. They’re like my refueling stations.

Q: How do you know when the art is finished?

A:  Time usually determines when I complete an illustration. I’ve had deadlines range from a few hours to a year. I’m pretty obsessive, so I like to approach my personal work with more of a marathon pace. When I really get into an artwork, I can’t stay away from it. I’m constantly thinking about it.

Penguin Orange Collection. Design by Paul Buckley

Q: What elements of daily life exert the most influence on your work practice?

A:  I don’t like to exercise, but I feel like I should so I spend time running and it becomes a metaphor for my art practice. Some days a run feels a lot better than other days, but it’s always one step at a time. I try to focus on the individual steps and less on when I will finish. I like to live through each line. The result is hopefully something beautiful, but also something people can spend a lot of time viewing.

I’ve also realized that ideas arrive in different ways. Sometimes I’ll have a wonderful idea arrive—immediately. Sometimes I need to spend a lot of time and grind out several ideas before the right one happens. Art is an exercise in patience for me. I can never be overconfident.

It’s important for me to periodically stop everything for a day and go look at art shows around town, or go sit somewhere and draw. Some would say it’s procrastination, but I think a certain amount of educational procrastination is really important for artist.

Q: What was your favorite book as a child?

A:  As a child I really loved all things Jack London, and I still do. I think I read White Fang, before Call Of The Wild. I love both.

Times Book Review, Art Direction Nicholas Blechman

Q: What is the best book you’ve recently read?

A:  My wife and I have fallen in love with Banff National Park. To me it symbolizes something that is quickly disappearing in the U.S. lower 48. I’m obsessed with brown bears. They’re the greatest North American land predator and they’re population continues to be decimated by people. I saw my first wild grizzly in Banff, and that’s where I discovered the Black Grizzly of Whisky Creek by Sid Marty, a local writer. He writes great memoirs from his time as a ranger in the Canadian Rockies.

I’m also working with National Geographic Art Director Melissa Farris on a cover for Pandora's Lab: Seven Stories of Science Gone Wrong by Paul Offitt, M.D. I really enjoy getting to read a book, before I start working on a cover. This was a really interesting and eye-opening read.

Q: If you had to choose one medium to work in for an entire year, eliminating all others, what medium would you choose?

A:  Artist Mark Bradford says that he likes to work on his giant collage paintings because they physically exhaust him. I think working on large paintings does this for me. I don’t get as many opportunities to work large these days, and it’s something I’ve wanted to get back to.

Q: If you could spend an entire day away from work and deadlines, what would you do and where?

A:  I’ve always wanted to go to Katmai National Park in Alaska to watch Brown Bears fishing for Salmon at Brooks Falls. Explore.org has a live stream of it that I have on while I’m working. The waterfall sound is really good background music for making art.

Nautilus Magazine. Art Director Len Small

Q: What was the [Thunderbolt] painting or drawing or film or otherwise that most affected your approach to art? 

A: During my time at Art Center, I became very tired of always organizing and planning everything out in a drawing. I needed to work more intuitively. In Rob Clayton’s Painting Experimentation Class, I took an entire term to create a large six-by-six-foot drawing. It was a huge turning point in my art practice because my drawing became a vehicle for discovery. I wasn’t just executing a plan, I was figuring things out as I went along. Even for commercial illustrations, I still try to keep my sketch loose enough so that I will discover things along the way. It keeps me engaged.

Q: What would be your last supper?

A:  It would probably be the original Katsuya in Studio City. It would be this or Biscuits and Gravy from the Nutty Tree, an old diner across the street from my parent’s Muffler shop when I was a kid. It was soooo good, but one day it went up in flames. I watched the whole thing burn to the ground, and they never re-opened… RIP Nutty Tree.

Eric Nyquist is an American artist working in Los Angeles. After graduating from Art Center College of Design in Pasadena, he began a career as a working artist and illustrator. His body of work includes meticulous drawings, paintings, and collages that merge the organic and the industrial.

Nyquist chooses the line as his tool in creating dense narratives so detailed they straddle the representative and the abstract. His work disrupts stereotypes and forces the viewer to go beyond simply “looking” at things. Each drawing asks us to see analytically and not just physically.

In a technological age of rapid image making, Nyquist uses classical methods to create contemporary results. From etching to lithography, he upholds the craft of print-making while expanding the possibilities of the medium. The printing process informs his drawings—as he arranges layers and screens of color and texture into each piece.

His work has been commissioned by institutions including NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, the Los Angeles Museum of Contemporary Art and The New York Times. He has also collaborated with fellow artists including Beck, Doug Aitken, and Jakob Dylan. His illustrations have been published all over the world in magazines, books, and newspapers including the 2014 best-selling Southern Reach trilogy by Jeff VanderMeer.
Website: http://www.ericnyquist.com
Instagram: ericbnyquist
Twitter: @EBnyquist
Tumblr: ericnyquist.tumblr.com
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