Interview: Shant Safarian

Posted on June 19, 2012 by Textbook

Shant Safarian is a passionate graphic designer who recently finished his final semester of study at Billy Blue College of Design.

Earlier this year, however, before finishing his Bachelor of Communication Design, he decided to give his North Sydney educational institution a rather impressive makeover. With a wall as his canvas, he designed and applied a Japanese style mural illustration for all to see.

While he was working on his masterpiece, Zilla and I were lucky enough to be on hand to capture the whole process. Zilla did his thing with his camera and I sat down with the man of the moment to discuss his amazing illustration.

Below you will find the interview I conducted with Shant, some photos of his illustration and a fantastic video Zilla has put together.

What first got you interested in design?

I’ve kind of always been into art, but I didn’t know there was a career in it. Like, I didn’t know there was such a thing as design. In year 11, I did a Certificate III course at Billy Blue and that got me interested in it. Then I decided to do a Bachelor and I’ve never looked back since. It’s the best decision I’ve ever made in my life.

Do you have a name for the piece?

No, not really.

Are you going to come up with a name when you’ve completely finished it?

Ah, probably not.

Why did you decide to do this mural illustration?

For Glory! [Laughs] I’ve had a really good time at Billy Blue, so I just wanted to leave something behind. That’s kind of like the reason why I wanted to do it.

What process does it take to put together a masterpiece like such?

I reckon you just need to be motivated and inspired. I’m not the most motivated guy, but when it comes to something that I really like, I’ll work at it.

First of all, I got a lot of different elements of things I wanted to do. Drew them, traced then, until I really had a clear vision of what I wanted, and then I kept drawing and kept tracing. It was basically hundreds of layers of tracing paper and just a pencil.

So, your idea and concept obviously evolved?

Definitely. It changed heaps.

Do you follow much local design in Sydney?

I’m always looking at what’s happening with design and what people are doing, but I wouldn’t know if it’s local or not. On websites it’s sometimes hard to know. I do like to stay in tune with what’s going on in the world of design.

Have you got any other projects coming up that we should know about?

I’m actually working on an Alien vs. Predator info graphic with one of my design buddies, Luke Szalla, who is called Zilla over at Primo! Magazine, right?

That’s right.

Well, yeah. That project is going to be big.

Where can we go to see more of your work?

I’ve got a portfolio page, so you can check that out to see more of my work.