Der Holländische Künstler Kwills begleitet uns nunmehr 5 Jahre. Vom ersten Koi Entwurf über Shirt Kollabos bis hin zu unserem aktuellen Projekt. Grund genug also den Mann hinterm Schwarz Stift zu einem Small Talk einzuladen. Here we go…:

Hey Quincy whats up. First of all i wanna say thank you for takin your time. We thought it would be cool to seen the man behind the pen. So let’s start.

Please tell us a lil something about you, Where are you from and stuff like that???

Hi! I’m from the Netherlands just about 45 minutes from you guys.

Been running Kwills from 2011 so basically celebrating my 5th anniversary this year.

How does a regular Kwills day look like. Wake up… Put some Sneaker on … Drink a coffee and start Sketching?

A typical would consist of me waking up, taking care of my little daughter first. After that’s done, breakfast is up and instead of a newspaper i’m scrolling through Instagram.

Shower and get dressed, sweatpants or shorts and believe it or not no sneakers, the Benassi Solarsoft slide is the main go to.

The workday is pretty straight forward, fire up the Mac and check/answer e-mails. The creative part starts pretty late in the day with warm-up sketching before moving to work related artwork.

Do you remember your first sketch? What was it?

My first sketch has to be when i was 5 years old and it was of my Dad’s.

Still have that drawing.

You re famous for your own style. Was it always like that, that you had your own style in mind since the beginning or did your style changed over the past few years?

Well thank you. No, it was always as it is now. Artists and their styles develop over time due to different experiences and influences. Around 1999-2000 i did internship at TBH-Q in Amsterdam (my childhood heroes) and they took it back to the basics i had to unlearn everything and build from scratch again. When doing that i was emulating Angel’s style with all the chunkiness and clean lines. I was doing that for a couple of years but ended being unfullfilled and was wondering what was lacking in my art.

Fast forward to 2010-2011 where i visited an art-agency to be represented. He started flipping through my portfolio and i noticed he was mildly impressed and reluctant. He asked me if i had anything else on me and i hesitantly showed him my sketchbooks. After 2-3 pages he was really enthusiastic and gave me valuable piece of free advice to keep on working in the sketch style because it showed so much more character and flavour. So since that day i’m focused on developing that style. As for the agency itself that didn’t work out quite that well in the end and i’ve freelancing since then actually.

So is it possible for you to live by drawing?

Not at this very moment, i still have a parttime job next to it.

Can you remember your very first sketch for us?

Yes it was the Asics Gel Lyte 3 for your “Best of Gel Lyte 3” t-shirt. I remember getting an e-mail from you guys when i was in Egypt on the Nile and i was really psyched and i think everything was done within a week after i came back from that holiday.

 You re also big into sneaker. Drawing or sneaker what came first and how does it look like today. You re more into sneaker or sketching?

Drawing/sketching was definitely first because that was and still is the thing i love to do most. The sneakers came afterwards.

Nowadays i try to sell a lot of my collection of shoes which i don’t wear but strangely enough buy new ones each week with Supreme’s Air Max 98s being the last ones i got. Also i’m more picky of which shoes to buy, i used to buy a lot back in the days like 10 pairs in one week. It’s more quiet now haha also because of the little one.

Let s talk a lil bit about sneaker. What do you think about the scene at the moment. Too big or just right?

Hmm…this is something that’s been on my mind for some time. A lot of different things are happening at the moment which wasn’t happening back then. The amount of collaborations have quadrupled every week there are 8 different new ones. The reselling is new as in people can make a lot of money off of it which personally i’m not too big a fan of but that’s a whole different discussion.

The attendance of sneaker conventions is still growing and i think that has to do with a huge load of legit sneakers in one space where you can inspect the condition of the shoes better and haggle about prices. Online sales are a nightmare because of scams and selling fakes so the conventions are a really good place to buy and sell and hang out with like-minded people.

Also the generation-change is something people have to get used to, the older generation saw everything start from the beginning and still living by certain codes such helping out people for nonfinancial gain, relacing shoes (not just wearing shoes but rocking them), taking care of shoes. This all stems from those day where it was scarce to find a decent pair because of its price or availability where as nowadays everything is instantly available, you don’t have to go the extra mile to obtain a certain shoe and if you can’t get that you’ll buy next week’s new limited collaboration to trade or whatever.

So in answering the original question it got bigger but it is evening out now.

When you first heard about the Afew Collab where they directly an Idea in your mind ?

You mean the Future Koi or the Best of Gel Lyte 3?

The Future Koi yes.

When i first heard it i had to google the company first to check what they’re about.

After that reading your brief it was a pretty clear vision of knowing what to do.

Whats so special about the Koi Future Camo?

It focuses on the Koi fish. I did some research on Koi fish and especially to flow and movement and i hope it comes across in the camo pattern.

The colours obviously are those of your shoe.

How would a Kwills collabo look like on a sneaker and which would it be?

There are some talks with a certain shoe-brand about collaborating so i can’t talk much about it for the moment.

The only thing that would be important to me is that should be a shoe which can be easily matched, is comfortable and have a story and cool details. Something you’d want to wear often because it just looks good.

Whats in your Pipeline. Any new Projects coming soon? We ve heard about a Collab with Nike. Is it true?

Yes i got some Kwills boxed logos coming out soon and yes Nike is up next which i can’t talk about much either lol.

Any last words???

Do what you love to do and have fun with it.

Love life and your family.

Easy.

Thanks mate. Perfect Last Words. We appreciate it. 

Wer jetzt Lust hat auf mehr von Kwills sollte mal seine Website abchecken. Der Mann hat schon so einiges gezeichnet. Wir bedanken uns ganz Herzlich für die Zeit und Energie die er in die Projekte gesteckt die uns jetzt schon das 4. Jahr über begleiten.