Tasheka Arceneaux-Sutton

I first learned about Tasheka Arceneaux-Sutton way back in 2015 when I interviewed Silas Munro. Since then, Tasheka has gone on to become one of the leading voices behind discovering Black people omitted from the graphic design history canon. Even design legend Dr. Cheryl D. Miller has sung her praises, so I knew I had to sit down with Tasheka and learn more about her remarkable journey.

Tasheka spoke to me about her experience as an educator and researcher, including an examination of her teaching philosophy. She also talked about growing up in New Orleans, her shift into design, working for the Navy Reservists, and even starting her own studio, Blacvoice Design. Lastly, she discussed her upcoming book Black Design in America, and shared how the different aspects of her work keep her motivated and inspired.

If there’s any lesson you learn from Tasheka, it should be this one: you have control over your own path as a designer, so work hard and you can make your dreams come true!

Interview Transcript

Maurice Cherry:
All right, so tell us who you are and what you do.

Tasheka Arceneaux-Sutton:
Hi, and first, I want to say Maurice, thanks for having me here on Revision Path. I’ve been a listener for a long time now, so I feel really grateful and honored to be here. My name is Tasheka Arceneaux-Sutton. I’m a designer, design educator. I run a design studio called Blacvoice. I also am a researcher, I guess, or design historian in regards to Black designers, as well as design writer.

Maurice Cherry:
How has this year been going for you so far?

Tasheka Arceneaux-Sutton:
Very busy, but good for the most part. It’s been a really, really good year with lots of new projects on the horizon. Exciting and exhausting, all at the same time.

Maurice Cherry:
Any plans for the summer?

Tasheka Arceneaux-Sutton:
Yes, family vacation is one of the plans. I will be attending Typographics, and I’ll be a speaker there. So it’s exciting because I’ve never been to the conference before, and it’s kind of strange to have that my first attendance there would be me actually giving a talk, so I’m excited about that. I’m going to be teaching, I guess, this summer. I don’t normally teach in the summer, but I’m co-running a design residency program at the University of Texas, Austin where I teach. So I’m looking forward to that as well. And I have a couple of writing projects that I’ll be working on over the summer, and some design stuff as well.

Maurice Cherry:
Nice. Sounds like you’re going to have a busy summer ahead.

Tasheka Arceneaux-Sutton:
Yes, for sure.

Maurice Cherry:
Now, speaking of teaching, you are teaching at two universities right now. You’re at Vermont College of Fine Arts, and you’re at the University of Texas at Austin, which is pretty new. You’ve been at VCFA what, for 10, 11 years now?

Tasheka Arceneaux-Sutton:
Yeah, it’s been 10 years in April. 10 years. I started there in 2013.

Maurice Cherry:
Wow.

Tasheka Arceneaux-Sutton:
It’s kind of crazy to think that I’ve been there that long, actually.

Maurice Cherry:
Congratulations.

Tasheka Arceneaux-Sutton:
Thank you.

Maurice Cherry:
What has the experience been like there?

Tasheka Arceneaux-Sutton:
Wow. The experience at VCFA has been truly amazing and transformative, and I think a lot of it has to do with the amazing faculty that’s there, that I teach with, who are not only colleagues but longtime friends now. It has to do with the sort of non-traditional structure of the program. We don’t have any classes or any courses. The program is, if you think about it as a two-year-long independent study, basically it’s a self-directed program where students decide on what they want to study and what they’re interested in. And the faculty is there basically, to sort of guide them and offer them resources, but it’s a self-directed program.

Maurice Cherry:
Well, that’s really interesting. No classes or courses?

Tasheka Arceneaux-Sutton:
No.

Maurice Cherry:
So you don’t have to put any curriculum together. That’s great.

Tasheka Arceneaux-Sutton:
No. So yeah, it’s definitely a different experience. So you do work with the students during the residency to come up with a semester plan on what they’re going to be working on throughout the semester. So as a faculty, you are there to help guide them and shape that semester plan. But again, it starts with what they’re interested in. We meet once a month. Students send their work via email, and then we have an hour conversation through, usually Zoom, and to talk about the work and sort of reflect on it, and kind of give feedback on how to move forward over the next month.

Maurice Cherry:
I love how sort of open that is, especially I think during this time when I know we’re not out of the pandemic, but certainly, I think it’s still a time where some schools are trying hybrid models or things. That sounds like the way that it’s set up at VCFA, it allows you to really still be able to learn in that type of environment.

Tasheka Arceneaux-Sutton:
Yes. I think the one thing that at the core of the program is, first of all, it’s really tailored to, working professionals are people. You don’t have to quit your job for two years to get an MFA. You can still work or run your business, or whatever it is you’re doing and still go to school. And this is something that we’ve been doing prior to the pandemic.

So when the pandemic happened, not saying that it didn’t change the program and how we teach, but we were already sort of interfacing in that way. So the only thing it stopped was having the week long residencies that we would have twice a year in person. Then that programming got moved to Zoom. But as far as the interaction between the student and the teacher, or we say the student and the advisor, that was already happening.

Maurice Cherry:
Now one of the professors that’s also there, we’ve had on the show. Oh God, that was a long time ago. We had Silas Munro on the show. This was I think, episode 85, 86, something like that. But he’s also a professor there, I believe.

Tasheka Arceneaux-Sutton:
Yeah. So Silas, so you brought Silas up. Silas is one of the reasons, that’s how I ended up at VCFA actually.

Maurice Cherry:
Okay.

Tasheka Arceneaux-Sutton:
He’s one of the founding members of the program and Silas and I, we overlap by a year at CalArts. And so yeah, when the program was starting up, he sent me an email and asked me to join the faculty. And I wasn’t able to join at the time because of obligations with teaching. But then the following semester in April of 2013, I was able to come on board as a visiting, as a guest. Sort of a preliminary or, I wouldn’t say probationary period, but just to test to see if it would work out for me and if it would work out for the program.

So yeah, I credit Silas to bringing me in to a community in the program that’s, like I said, it’s been really transformative. Especially, the sort of approach to design pedagogy, this openness and not having this one idea of what design is. That sort of shift and change and marks according to the students, and the type of work that they’re interested in, and the type of diversity and the faculty and what we study and research, and type of work we’re engaged in. So that’s the thing that I really like, and it’s probably one of the few places that I’ve worked where I really felt a sense of family with my coworkers. Not that I didn’t have that relationship with other places, but there it’s really genuine. It’s not forced, it’s not fake. We actually truly do like and love each other.

Maurice Cherry:
I mean, first of all, props to Silas for bringing you in, but it sounds like it is a great environment because you’ve been there for 10 years. Nobody’s going to stay there for 10 years if it’s not good.

Tasheka Arceneaux-Sutton:
Yeah, no, that’s true. Actually, you saying it, it’s technically the longest job I’ve ever had.

Maurice Cherry:
Wow.

Tasheka Arceneaux-Sutton:
When I think about it, yeah.

Maurice Cherry:
Now you’re also teaching at University of Texas at Austin, which is fairly new. Tell me more about that. How’s that experience?

Tasheka Arceneaux-Sutton:
Wow, it’s been great, to be honest. I haven’t been there that long. I just moved to Austin, so I’m new to Austin and I’m new to UT. It’s been a really good experience as far as working in an environment with, I guess kind of similar to VCFA, where you don’t feel like there’s this sort of one way that the faculty or the program is trying to teach design. It’s a little bit more flexible, it’s a little bit more nuanced where students get to dabble in a lot of different areas of design. Graphic design, industrial design, interactive design, design history, product design. So it’s really sort of flexible in that way and that’s one of the things that sort of drawed me in into UT.

The program itself was revamped around 2017, 2018. So the program as it is today, design, it’s the Department of Design and Creative Technology, is fairly new in a sense compared to a lot of other programs that are out there. So I think there’s something about that sort of newness. There’s a lot of vulnerability and a lot of questioning about the direction of the program. So it’s kind of exciting to be somewhere where we’re constantly thinking about ways to evolve and improve the experience for the students.

Maurice Cherry:
Yeah. What is your teaching philosophy? I would imagine, between the work you’ve done at VCFA and are currently doing, and now with teaching at UT. And you’ve taught at some other places as well. What’s your overall teaching philosophy?

Tasheka Arceneaux-Sutton:
Well, one is, I try to approach teaching, one of the things that probably on the first day of class, I let my students know that, “Hey, I’m interested. I’m more interested in what you’re interested in learning, and what you’re interested in general out there in the world.” Not that I don’t have anything to impart or to give to them, but it’s less about me walking into the classroom saying, “Hey, listen up, I’m the expert here. You all need to learn what I have to offer.” Obviously, there is an important exchange that’s sort of happening, but I’m not interested in the hierarchies that traditionally plagues, I think, academia. So that’s the first thing is, to let my students know, “Hey, I’m curious about you, who you are as a person, and what you’re interested in.”

The other part of my teaching philosophy is, so how do I nurture that? How do I give them assignments, and give them projects and things to learn, to help nurture those interests? So often, I give projects and things that are about to help students investigate their community, and their environment and their identity. I think it’s really important for students to feel a connection to the project brief, to what they’re working on. And to figure out how to sort of channel their life’s experiences, as well as who they are into their projects. There are some practical exercises that are given to topography to talk about kerning and leading and that kind of stuff. But the start of bigger projects, I really try to figure out how to give assignments to help them sort of explore who they are in their environment and their community. Also, really, I think it’s important, one of my other goals is to make sure that I’m giving them projects or I’m giving them things to read and write about, and to consider about what’s going on in the world.

I like having discussions and I don’t shy away from, I won’t say controversial conversations, but I don’t like to shy away from, there’s always a group of students that have a certain perspective about another thing, and then you might have another group that have a different perspective. So I like having those type of conversations so we can learn from each other, because too many times that we all are always listening to and engaging in conversation with people who have the same perspective as we do. So, I always often give reading assignments, or articles or essays, or just come up with topics or things that might make some of them feel uncomfortable sometimes, where they have to talk about things that they don’t know how it’s going to be received by their classmates. And also, try to give them a sort of sense of agency and responsibility when it comes to their own learning, and not just take everything at face value to question, even question me, right? But obviously with the mutual respect, I guess.

Maurice Cherry:
I’d love to hear an example of something you would cover in class with your students.

Tasheka Arceneaux-Sutton:
Sometimes, it’s as simple as, I think this project isn’t something kind of, out of the park, but giving them … One time I had students design sort of protest signage. So they could approach it with whatever topic, anything that they felt really strongly about. Some people feels really strongly about, you should have solar panels on your house. Some people still feel really strongly about abortion, which sometimes for me, some of these topics that are still surfacing are kind of surprising. And some people feel strongly about police rights and things like that.

So any type of way I can give them some kind of assignment that addresses these issues, usually I try to get them to think about stuff that’s relevant in the media. Things that people are on opposite sides or sort of butting heads about, just to see, how do you handle that in the design context? Even, how do you handle as a designer having conversations about, “Well, if you have a very specific social or political agenda, what does it means to do design? Or could you do design for somebody to have a different perspective than you do?” So those type of conversations I think, are important to have.

Maurice Cherry:
Yeah, I totally think that’s important because at any point throughout your design career, you’re going to encounter some conflict. I mean, I think we know the goal is to try to not have this sort of conflicts with clients or prospective clients or anything like that, but it’s going to happen. I mean sometimes you’ll have a client, you think they’re one way, and then you start working with them and it’s completely different. And even as you’ve said about personal views and such like that, it can get really tricky because the world is not just, I mean, not to use this as a racial thing, but it’s not a black and white place. There’s all sorts of ambiguity and things in there. So the fact that you’re able to work out those scenarios and issues with students in a learning environment is really important, because then they don’t get out there in the real world and have greater consequences for those sorts of scenarios.

Tasheka Arceneaux-Sutton:
Yeah. So that’s one of the reasons why I do it, because I feel like if we can’t have these open discussions and conversation and academic space, then what’s the point of education or school in that environment? At least, that’s how I look at it.

Another project that I did when I was working at NC State last year was, I tasked my students with doing some design research in their hometown. So if they were from Charlotte, if they were from, I don’t know, somewhere in Germany, it didn’t really matter where they were from, but they had to do research about design in their particular community, where they were from. It was up to them if they wanted to pick where they live presently or somewhere where they were raised. And I gave them some sort of guidelines or places to start, I would say, because obviously if you said, “Okay, go research Charlotte, they may not know where to start.”

So I gave them four different areas to start. So I said, “Hey, why don’t you research the educational institutions, find out what schools offer design programs and research their faculty to see who’s working there? What type of design work or research that they do? Research the history publications in your particular area,” because I think newspapers and those type of print media is a good place to find the history of a place, sort of like the pulse, right? Design studios, talk to people there, make a list of all the ones that exist, maybe find out information about ones that used to exist. And I think the last place was printers. If they’re like print shops, go talk to those people. So those were the different areas as far as starting points that I gave them to start their research.

And then they had to interview people to help fill in the gaps of trying to create that sort of storyline. Because part of what they had to actually design was some kind of information design, but this wasn’t about charts and graphs. It was more like a storytelling or narrative sort of based research project, if you will. And then it was all the data, information was sort of collected in this zine that each student sort of designed together, and got it professionally printed at the end of the semester.

And I think it was a really good project. They learned a lot about design from where they were from, that they didn’t know, that they probably wouldn’t have even thought about if they didn’t have this project. And they learned something about themselves. I think for some of them, it was confidence boost. If you’re from somewhere or you come from an area where maybe design isn’t talked about or there are not a lot of people you see in design that look like you, and I think this project sort of helped them do some research and some discovery in those areas.

Maurice Cherry:
Now, what do you learn from your students? I mean, you mentioned earlier that you tell them at the beginning of the courses that you’re interested in learning from them. What kind of things do you learn?

Tasheka Arceneaux-Sutton:
I learn a lot from them. I think I can admit as a seasoned educator professional, but sometimes I go into the classroom with certain types of assumptions or misconceptions. So a lots of times, I might have assumptions what I think they might be interested in or what they should be. But then I learn actually, what they’re actually more interested in, and that sort of shifts and change sometimes. So for instance, a lot of students, now what I’m seeing, maybe something that’s trending because of technology is that, this sort of longing for tactile things, this longing to create and print things. Lots of times I think that students wouldn’t be interested in learning about letterpress, or screen printing or these sort of, or electroset. Electroset is something I love, doing electroset exercises with my students. And I really enjoy being able to talk to them about the history behind these all ways of printing.

But I find they’re really interested in these things. And I mean, you do have some that are like, “Okay, I’m really more comfortable in a digital space, and that’s fine.” Again, I’m not there to try to not nurture what their interests are. But, I feel like I’m also there for to say, “Hey, look over here. There are these other ways of making and approaching design that sort of outside of maybe what you think you should be doing.” Or lots of times, I feel what I have learned is there are very specific things that sometimes students think, “Okay, design should be this way or look this way.” And a lot of it has to do with the tools that they’re using, because everybody’s using Adobe Sweden, everybody’s using Illustrator or whatever. And I try to tell them, “Well, if we’re all using the same tools, then everything starts to look the same. But why not take your ideas, and have your ideas and the content have to dictate what type of tool you use.”

So a lot of times I learn a lot that I shouldn’t make assumptions, about technology or different ways in which how they’re interested in making, or what they actually want to make. Sometimes I assume, “Oh, they’re probably interested in developing an app,” and they do have those type of interests, or they’re interested in AI. But then I find so many of them when it comes to technology, they’re like, “No, I don’t even want to touch that stuff over there. I want to get my hands dirty.”

Maurice Cherry:
Yeah. That is so fascinating to hear that students want to do kind of tactile things. I do a lot of different types of judging throughout the year. I’ll judge design competitions. I look at portfolios and things like that from students. And I have started to see more actual tactile work books, or pamphlets or zines or something like that. It’s such a stark contrast to 20 years ago. Now, I didn’t go to design school, but I knew people that were in design school at the time that I was also in school and everybody wanted a piece of digital. I guess it’s because it was just coming about at that time. I mean, when I went to college, there were computers. I remember vividly wanting to, I majored in computer science, computer engineering, and then switching my major over to math. Because I told my advisor I wanted to learn web design, and he’s like, “Yeah, that’s a fad. No one’s going to be into that sort of stuff.” And the school that I went to didn’t have an arts program, didn’t have a design program, so I just switched over to math.

But I knew people that were at the Atlanta College of Art, which existed back then, and the Art Institute of Atlanta. And everybody was just clamoring to try to do something with digital because they were tired of print. They were tired of, I guess, I don’t want to say they were doing maybe more traditional things like electroset or things like that. But everybody wanted to get in on the newness. And now, 20 years from then when technology is everywhere, now students want to get tactile, they want to make stuff. Yeah, I think that’s pretty cool.

Tasheka Arceneaux-Sutton:
Yeah, I think the thing that I have to keep in mind is that the way they’re growing up and how they’re entering these spaces in this world is very different from how I entered it, where I was there prior to computers and then post. Not that, to be honest, I don’t have the pay stop experience. I mean, I was in school at the advent of, Adobe was already there, Photoshop was already there. The Mac computer was already there in the early two thousands. So I was sort of a little bit post the desktop publishing area. But I think the thing that I forget is that, well, they’re so consumed, this is all they know. So for them they need a break. They are exhausted from the screen is what they tell me. So they’re kind of exhausted from it. And so when you show these other analog processes, they really light up. It’s really nice and encouraging to see that they still have these interests.

But again, there are some that are really interested in the technology. A lot of them are interested in the 3D sort of space and the digital space, but also the physical space. There are sort of a range. But I think that’s what I learn. The more I teach, the more I learn about what the sort of dynamics to what they’re interested in. And they have various interests and it’s not good to even put them into a box and assume what they’re interested in because, it’s a lot of different things that are out there.

Maurice Cherry:
Nice. I love that. I love that. Students are tired of screens. I’m loving hearing that. Now, let’s learn more about you. Let’s hear your origin story. You’re originally from New Orleans. Is that right?

Tasheka Arceneaux-Sutton:
Yes, yes.

Maurice Cherry:
Tell me about what it was growing up there.

Tasheka Arceneaux-Sutton:
Yeah, I grew up in the inner city, not on the outskirts. I grew up in New Orleans, we sort of identified with the wards, which are actually voting wards. So I grew up in the seven ward, New Orleans, which the time that I grew up was predominantly Black or all Black maybe, don’t know the statistics on that, but a very urban inner city. Grew up poor, single mom, family. I’m the oldest of four siblings. Had a good childhood. I remember going outside and play, making games up as we go, just started using resources and things that we had around to play different sports, so to do different things. My mom was always really supportive in whatever it was I wanted to do. So when I was younger, I wanted to go to law school. Actually, I wanted to be an attorney. And so, I actually approached going to college, thinking that I was going to go to law school and practice law, actually.

Maurice Cherry:
Oh wow. What interested you about law?

Tasheka Arceneaux-Sutton:
To be honest, Maurice, it was, the part of it that was probably really superficial, meaning I watched a lot of court shows growing up, and I got sucked into the drama of the investigations. And this aha moment when the real person, suspect was revealed. And the banter in the court and the back and forth between the attorneys, all the drama. So that seemed exciting because I always felt like, I’ve always had a strong voice, I guess, and a strong personality and perspective in that way. I can be very argumentative about things that I’m super passionate about. So I just thought I would be a good attorney. Why not? I was a good student, usually brought home good grades. So yeah, I could do this law school thing, and I can go to law school and do that.

The other side of it is, I also saw law as something that oppressed us as a people for a long time, and I wanted to understand it better to help us. So that was the sort of flip side of my interest in going to law school. But yeah, that faded when I actually, I mean I was really, up until my last year in college, I was still pursuing going to law school, to be honest.

Now, I was at Loyola, I was an English writing major. And the reason I picked that major was because I was told … I can’t remember if it was a job fair or a college fair when I was in high school and somebody said, “Oh, people who do really well in law school, they major in English because of all the writing and research you have to do,” whatever. So that’s really how that came about. And I did a lot of reading growing up. So the idea of having to read and write was kind of made sense, something I was sort of interested in. So yeah, that’s how that came about was because I wanted to be a good law student, to be honest.

Maurice Cherry:
So you had been on this path, I mean, to the point where you went to school, you were studying in it, you were getting all the way up to your senior year. Was there a deciding incident that kind of changed your trajectory?

Tasheka Arceneaux-Sutton:
The incident was preparing to take the LSAT, I would say. So it was more like a process. So I want to say the first semester of my senior year, I was preparing to take the LSAT, researching what schools to go to. And all of that became extremely overwhelming and stressful, but it wasn’t exciting in a way, how things could be really overwhelming, but you’re still sort of excited about it, and if it’s you’re anxious. And so then I did some soul-searching and it was like, “Well, why do you want to do this Tasheka? Why do you want to go to law school?” And so, one of the things that is at the time it was really hard for me to admit, was that I honestly didn’t think I was good at anything, or I didn’t know what I was really good at. So because I was always sort of a good student, I just kind of looked at it as that way. I can go to law school, I’m going to be a good student, and then I’ll get a decent job.

I have always been a very goal driven oriented person. And so for me, it was always just sort of scratching things off the list. So go to school, major in English writing, do well, go to law school, take the LSAT, get a high grade, study. It’s just this constant thing. But when I actually really looked within, I realized that, well, I didn’t want to do it for the right reasons. You shouldn’t choose a career path just because it’s sort of checking off the list. I can accomplish this thing, but it’s not something that, I mean, I had a genuine interest in the law, but when I look back, yeah, it definitely wasn’t the right path for me.

So I just remember there was this one day, I used to do work study in the library. I just started going online and doing research about what do creative people do. So copywriter came about because I’m getting a degree in English, but at the time I didn’t feel too confident about my writing skills. So I was like, “Eh, I don’t really want to do that.” And then I remember, topography kept popping up, and this isn’t a time where in the early two thousands, when they had a lot of portfolio schools, like Miami AD and those type of schools.

So I was doing research and those type of schools kept popping up, and then I kept seeing topography and I’m like, “What is topography? I don’t even know what that is.” So I looked in the school course catalog and I saw topography one and two, and then it was graphic design and I didn’t know what any of these, I wasn’t aware of any of this stuff, or what that meant as far as a career. And so the more I read and the more I did my research, I was like, “Oh, this design thing sounds really interesting.”

So the next semester, I just went head first. I signed up to take a type one and a design one class, the year, the semester I was supposed to graduate. And then I fell in love with it. And then I pushed my graduation back about a year so I could get a minor in graphic design. And I didn’t get a true minor. I kind of had a relationship with the director of the art department at the time, because throughout my time in college, I took drawing and painting classes as my elective, because I’ve always had an affection for art and drawing. So I talked to her at the time and about getting a minor, and so they sort of told me that, just take the main classes. I didn’t have to take the foundations and stuff like that. So they sort of fast tracked me into design one and however many classes I could take within a year, because Loyola is a private Jesuit liberal university, just very expensive. And I was on a scholarship, so that extra year, I could only go to school those two extra semesters.

So I did that. After that year, it was like, “Okay, I’m a graphic designer now. That’s it. This is what I want to do.” Yeah.

Maurice Cherry:
That’s a really interesting turn. I mean, you were already set to go along this way, and then you kind of just had another idea and there you go.

Tasheka Arceneaux-Sutton:
Yeah. It wasn’t something that was obviously planned out in that way, but I’ve never looked back. I can’t honestly imagine being in any other field than design, to be honest.

Maurice Cherry:
Yeah, that’s really awesome that it sort of came about that way. I’m curious now on what Tasheka the lawyer would be like, if you would’ve went there.

Tasheka Arceneaux-Sutton:
I think about it, too. I don’t know, honestly. I mean, I think there’s a way that I would’ve found my niche. I would’ve found an area of law that would’ve been good for me. I don’t know how lucrative that would’ve been, especially if you think about going to a private undergraduate school, and then law school and then student … It’s just sort of the bills and student loans to pile up when you think about it. So yeah, I don’t know. I think I would’ve found my way, but I think that it definitely wasn’t the right path for me. And I think the sort of activist in me, I would’ve found whatever I guess sort of industry I would’ve ended up, I think I would’ve found that sort of angle.

But I do remember this one conversation I had with a lady at a job fair my senior year, and she said that her husband was an attorney and that he had a studio in their attic and he was a painter. And she said that, but once he started really getting into law, he stopped painting as much as he used to. And so I started thinking that I never wanted art to not be a part of my life. So that was sort of a reality check where I was, “Oh, I don’t want to go into law if this is going to prevent me from being creative or being a maker,” I guess.

Maurice Cherry:
Yeah. So you graduated from Loyola, and I know later you went and got your MFA from CalArts. Between then, did you get out in the working world and experience a little bit of what it was like to not be a student for a while?

Tasheka Arceneaux-Sutton:
Yes. It was a very short time. It was exactly a year and four months to date. So yeah, after I graduated, I end up working as a designer at the Navy, which was such a strange thing for me personally, to end up working for the military. But yeah, I worked for the Navy Reservist Public Affairs Office, and they hired me because they saw my resume, that I took topography classes, which is kind of funny when I think about it. Because it’s like, well, when you go to, you study design, you take topography. It wasn’t nothing special. But anyway, but one of the other reasons they hired me was because they wanted somebody young with fresh ideas. And at the time, they were publishing and producing a tabloid newspaper. And so they wanted me on board to help transition that newspaper into a monthly magazine.
I actually stayed there long enough just to do that, basically. We had a few firsts. I guess half the time I was there, we were publishing the newspaper. Then the second half, we transitioned over to a magazine, and that’s my first job. I will say that it was a really great learning experience in school, as far as print production and that kind of stuff. You don’t necessarily learn. So the Navy, I would drive to Panama City to go see the publication on press, that kind of stuff. So I learned all the production there. So yeah, it was a really good experience for me, as far as my first professional design job.

Maurice Cherry:
And you were able to get that, I mean, one right out of school because you had this small amount of design experience just from studying, and they were like, “Yeah, we’ll go with that.” Nowadays, for entry level position, they already want you to have three years experience somewhere. So it’s good that they kind of took a chance and said, “Yeah, we’ll move forward and see what you have.”

Tasheka Arceneaux-Sutton:
Yeah, I will say it was actually a head hunter that found me, or like a temp agency, I would say. And they put me in contact with the Navy. And I think that they were, because they were producing a publication, it was probably a time crunch. And so, I don’t know if I was the first person they referred them to. I don’t know if they had interviewed a bunch of other people. I have no idea. But I just knew that, oh, they were also impressed that I studied abroad. I’m trying to think of the things that they said to me during the interview or that made them sort of intrigued or want me to come in. They liked that I had spent some time abroad and that I took topography courses, to be honest.

Maurice Cherry:
Okay. Where did you study abroad?

Tasheka Arceneaux-Sutton:
I studied abroad in Prague, in the Czech Republic. And it was mainly, it was more of a printmaking study abroad than graphic design. I mean, the graphic design aspect of it, was it that there was this workshop or this class that we took to set up design posters by hand. All analog, which was great, but it was really for printmaking, like lithography, learning to do aquatints and that kind of stuff.

And it was interesting, because it was actually with a program that was through NC State, and one of my professors at Loyola at the time was the person who was in charge. I had started that study abroad program. So it was kind of weird last year when I worked at NC State, it was like, “Oh, I did a study abroad program at this place and now I’m teaching here.” So I don’t know, it’s just kind of funny how things kind of happen that way in life.

Maurice Cherry:
So tell me how your experience was getting your MFA at Cal Arts.

Tasheka Arceneaux-Sutton:
That in of itself was an experience. CalArts was tough. I mean, I definitely went there knowing that it was going to be difficult, that it wasn’t going to be easy. Actually, I was there for three years. I got accepted for the three-year track. So a lot of schools now have a three year and a two-year track, and normally the three-year track is reserved for students who don’t have a traditional graphic design background. And so since my degree wasn’t in design, it was in English. And then, I had that limited experience, that year and a half working for the Navy. So I actually did three years instead of two. So the first year was, I guess an adjustment and challenging, in and of itself. For one, I was the only Black student there in the graduate and the undergraduate program, which for me was pretty shocking.

And the reason it was surprising is because I think, to be honest, at the time I was just starting, right before grad school and doing my first year of grad school. I was just starting to notice how there was a lack of visibility of Black people in design, or how the design profession didn’t seem to, or the lack of diversity that existed. Honestly, I don’t know why it took that long for me to actually realize that, but it wasn’t until, I think it was the 2004 AIGA conference that I realized that, where I saw maybe four or five other Black people at the conference. It was in Vancouver, I remember that. And then that’s when, that was not long before I actually started school at CalArts.

So that experience, and that was the thing that I think started me on this kind of trajectory, or the path into doing the research that I do, was looking around, not seeing anybody like me. Not learning anything about anybody who looked like me with the history class, or so, yeah, that’s sort of where I started. And me being at CalArts as a student, sort of asking the question, talking to faculty or just saying. Even sometimes it was in my work, I was questioning, where are the Black designers? When was the last time CalArts had a Black student in the MFA program? Nobody can answer that question. Or can you tell me something about Black people in design history? Nobody can answer that question.

So it became this thing where, and I know we’ve done similar sort of scavenger hunts. It’s like, “Where the hell are all the Black people?” So anyway, that is where my research started. So because I couldn’t find anything out there that was tangible to hold onto, I just started doing my own research and investigation. Because I was like, “There’s nobody who’s here to tell me or give me that information. I have to discover it from myself.”

But I will say the faculty there was all, for the most part, it was, I felt supported. Although it was tough. It was like bootcamp, going to CalArts. It was a really, really tough, intense program. But I did feel encouraged most of the time for the type of projects that I had. And some of them was filled with a lot of emotion and anger, and aggression and frustration, and a lot of times that came out. But I will say that they sort of helped me nurture and cultivate my voice, and they also always encouraged me to be true, to keep that investigation and then that energy, and to being inquisitive about my design, Black design history, and culture and identity.

Maurice Cherry:
I think it’s such a good thing now that it almost feels like, I’d say maybe within the past, I don’t know, 10, 15 years perhaps, we’ll say that. But we’ve started to see more Black design educators out there, and we’ve also started to see community efforts. I mean, Revision Path is one of them, but we’ve started to also see community efforts with making sure that Black people, and I would say Black and brown, I mean, I would kind of widen that lens a bit. But we’ve started to see now more people of color in general, being talked about, recognized, showcased, researched as it comes to design. I mean, I don’t know if we’ll get to a point where there’s full equity with regards to that, but I think within the past 10 years, we’ve seen a lot of headway in that direction, where we’re starting to now see more Black students, or at least more talk about Black designers throughout history. You know what I mean?

Tasheka Arceneaux-Sutton:
Yes, I would agree with that. There is definitely some sort of shift. I mean, if I’m honest, I’m not seeing it enough or as much as I would like to see it. But I’m also aware that things do take time, and especially when you have things that are so systemic and that’s a part of system that’s been there for so long that it’s not, it takes a long time to sort of dismantle it.

If I’m honest, I do believe that it doesn’t have to, or it shouldn’t take it as long, but I understand it. I try to understand it. I do think that things can happen a lot quicker, but I do realize that there are still certain structures that are there, that’s way more difficult to dismantle to where it takes a lot longer. But I am happy to have colleagues. I didn’t think that I would see a day where I could name at least three other Black women that are doing similar type of work or things like that. So I am happy to see that there’s a change, and there’s a lot of work and way more work that needs to be done. But yeah, I agree. There are more efforts, I guess, and more initiatives that are happening at different places.

Maurice Cherry:
Yeah, I think with schools, it’s just always going to take longer because schools are just such, these large institutions. Of course, they get funds from different philanthropists and foundations and stuff like that. But I agree with you, in that I think the change could be happening a lot quicker. I a hundred percent agree with you there.

Tasheka Arceneaux-Sutton:
Yeah. I just think that one of the things that I liked about UT was they started changing their admissions process. I think there are still more work to be done, but they have done away with the traditional portfolio. And so, their admission process is more a design prompt, so a student could … So the design program looks at just that one particular piece that they’re doing, and then they submit a 60-minute video that sort of talks about their process and their ideas, alongside the piece that they made for admissions.

So I think that, that takes a lot of pressure off because you still have so many students that, they don’t have the resources in their high schools to submit even a fine arts portfolio, let alone something that’s specific to design. Where you need all these different, you need a computer, you need the Adobe software, you need all these digital tools that a lot of high schools still don’t have those type of resources. So it’s nice to see that they’re at least trying to change that process a little bit, to make it more equitable for students of color to have access to the program.

Maurice Cherry:
Now, along with you being a design educator, and you mentioned this a bit earlier, you have your own design studio called Blacvoice Design. Tell me more about that. What are some of the projects or other work that you’ve done through your studio?

Tasheka Arceneaux-Sutton:
Well, a lot of projects I would say, first start off with the type of clients that I work with. So most of my clients are educational institutions like universities, colleges and things like that, nonprofit organizations, as well as kind of start up or small businesses. And I actually like the work that I do within those spaces. The type of projects that I do, format wise, most of them are books. I design a lot of books, but I don’t like to just consider myself a book designer because I do do identity projects and things like that. But a lot of the books that I do design, because a lot of my clients have modest budgets, usually I’m given texts and that’s it.

And so, I think that’s why I wear this hat of an image maker, because a lot of projects might call for me to take photos and I’ll take my own photographs for a particular project, or I do my own illustrations and create my own imagery for them. And so that I actually like. I like that whole process of generating the imagery, and doing the type setting, and doing the layout and the design. I really do enjoy being a part of that process from the beginning to the end. I thought at this point in my career that I would want to be in a more creative director sort of role, but I actually like and still enjoy being hands on.

So some projects that I’ve worked on in the past that are really kind of dear to my heart is, I used to do some work for a nonprofit organization. They’re now called 826 New Orleans, but they used to be called Big Class. And Big Class is a nonprofit organization. They started off basically sort of reaching out to the inner city public schools. And so, they would have writing prompts or writing projects for students to engage in after school. And so they would come up with themes, the students would come up with themes or topics that they wanted to write about. Usually it had to do with their feelings around their culture and their community.

And so, what I would do is basically, I would come in, talk to the student editorial board, find out what ideas they have about the design and the design process, and basically use that as information or inspiration and design a book for these individual projects. And so Big Class would take those books, they would have these readings, they would get people, they had their own press and their own imprint. And so they would publish and sell the books, and then they would just feed and go back into the sort of program. And I really like that program, because it not only gets students excited about writing, and writing is a form of expression, writing can be creative, right? Writing, I think gave them a sense of agency because they get to write, they get to publish, they get to put it out there, they get to have open mic and spoken words.

And so, I really love to see the sort of confidence that it gave these students, that maybe in their school, they may not ever have that type of experience. So for me to provide a platform for them to express themselves through words, through writing, I really did enjoy working with them. But now they’re part of this larger, more national collection of programs, that’s like 826 New Orleans, you have 826 Valencia. So 826 sort of exists in a lot of different cities. And my hope is to, there isn’t an 826 in Austin. Honestly, have no idea how to even start one. And it’s not that I even want to be in charge of one, but I would love to try to figure out how to create a rapport with some of the schools, some of the public schools here in Austin to try to get one started here. And then that way, it’s something that I would like my students at UT to be involved in that process, of helping those students design and get their work printed and published.

Maurice Cherry:
I’m a big advocate of designers needing to do more writing. A hundred percent. We had at one point in time, kind of design anthology called Recognize that we were doing through Revision Path, where we had designers just like, we would give a particular prompt or theme. I think the one we did before we shut it down was reset. I think reset was the theme. And so based off of that, we wanted people to submit essays up to 3000 words, centered around reset in whatever way that they wanted to. But it had to be design focused, like design writing. We didn’t get great ones. I’ll be completely honest. I think a lot of people rather wanted to design something than write something.

And even the first year that we did it, we would get some pushback from people, “Well, why do I have to write something?” I’m like, “It’s a essay.” I mean, you have to write something because that’s the structure of it. I do want to bring it back one day if Revision Path can get the right funding and all of that. Because, I’m still a big proponent and believer of designers, I think, need to be, they need to know how to write because of course, it just helps you get your ideas out there. But it’s just so helpful for, and I think this probably ties into your research focus. It ties into your work being part of the cannon. If you can write down what you did, the work you did, case studies, et cetera, if it gets put out there in some way, if it gets preserved in some way, you’re now part of the cannon.

One thing with me, when I try to find guests for the show, it’s very hard for me to book a guest when I can’t find anything on them. I could maybe find-

Tasheka Arceneaux-Sutton:
Yeah, you could maybe do some research.

Maurice Cherry:
Well, yeah, because I can maybe find a website or there’s maybe a blog post or something somewhere, but I need to be able to see what you’ve done so I can get a sense of who you are as a designer, if this is going to be a good fit, that sort of thing. But I say all of that to say that I’m a big, just huge fan of designers being writers, and write it down, write down your work, show your work.

Tasheka Arceneaux-Sutton:
I agree with that too, Maurice. And even as a person, I still think I have a very strange or uncomfortable, I think it’s a better word, relationship with writing. It’s something that with my teaching, I always make sure that there’s some writing component in a project for students, whether it’s a reflection to something they read or something they saw. I think it’s really important. I see a lot of similarities in the writing, in the design process. So for me, it’s been, although it’s still a place where I’m super uncomfortable in lots of times, a few years ago, to be honest, I think it was back in 2017 when I was teaching at Southeastern Louisiana University, and I had just gotten tenured there. And I didn’t realize at the time that until I was at NC State during that interview process, that up until that point, I had got tenured because of my creative work, because of doing exhibitions and things like that.

And at that point, I realized that with the research that I was doing, and then at that time, my research was startup, sporadic, how I was engaged with it. I started this research in graduate school, and then I would start to engage with it from time to time when somebody would ask me to give a lecture. And at some point, going back to what you were saying about the importance of the canon and sort of writing things down, that became a real turning point for me because at that point, I wanted to change my practice a little bit, and have it more focused on writing and publishing. Because in my mind, I’m like, “Well, I can continue to do these lectures and talk about this stuff, but then what?”

Maurice Cherry:
Yeah, yeah.

Tasheka Arceneaux-Sutton:
What do you with it? And so I knew at some point I always wanted to write a book about Black design history. I knew, even from grad school back at CalArts, that’s something I wanted to do. I think, not until that point, I became more intentional about it. I was like, “Okay, if I want to shift,” not do away with making, not do away with freelance, not doing away with that work, but I wanted to be more intentional about the scholarly part of me, I guess, in that work. And sort of getting it out there and not have it just be through lectures. And I think, oral history and that stuff is valuable. I’m not trying to devalue that at all, but I do think there’s something about having something written and on a page, and printed and sort of documented. Right? I mean, I think it’s really important for our work and stuff to be documented, so it can be passed on.

Maurice Cherry:
Exactly. I mean, the oral storytelling, and I realize we’re saying this on a podcast, but is mean that is important. But being able to write it down, pass it on, put it in a book, have it stored somewhere, that is what is really, that is the canon. That’s what you end up preserving. Speaking of books, I mean, we’re both working on books, but part of the research that I find is trying to find these writings and trying to find where people have talked about stuff. And you know what we’re doing now? Interviews. We’re having to talk to people because we can’t find where folks have written stuff down. So to that end, about books, as I mentioned that just now, you’re working on a book called Black Design in America. Talk to me about that.

Tasheka Arceneaux-Sutton:
Yeah, so I’m a co-author of Black Design America, African-Americans, and African Diaspora and Graphic Design, 19th to 21st Century. My co-authors are Silas Munro and Pierre Bowins. And how this book came about is not a linear kind of trajectory of story. So back in 2020, when George Floyd was murdered and you had the protests going on, and a lot of things were sort of happening online, VCFA had started this sort of virtual programming. I believe they contacted me and asked me if I was interested in doing a lecture or something about my research. And so at the time, I want to say around that time, I can’t remember exactly, but I know at some point, me, Pierre, and Silas had created a Google Doc, and we just started populating it with our research. And some of our focus on our research was slightly different. There was some overlap, but we started this Google Doc, and I think we started it with the intent of writing a book someday.

So the idea was that, “Okay, we want to have this document populated to start working on the outline.” So VCFA came to me. I decided that I didn’t want to just be the only voice talking about Black design history. So I invited Pierre and Silas to also give a lecture. So they call it these micro lectures. So still had the same amount of time that I had to give my lecture, but instead of me talking for an hour or 45 minutes, we each had 15 minutes to do a micro lecture, a mini presentation about our specific research.

So again, around that time, I met Dr. Cheryl Miller, and she was just starting, or had already started her archive for Stanford, a Black design history archive. And somebody gave her my name. And so, I met with her about sending my work there. And something that I still feel weird about saying was that was my first time hearing about her and her work, but I’m glad I did. I’m glad that we had that opportunity to talk and connect. And now she’s a huge mentor and influence, inspiration in my life. But that conversation with her sort of gave me a little focus. So I was like, “Oh, I’m really interested in the history of Black women in graphic design too.” So my portion of the lecture was about that.

So we’re in the midst of the pandemic, and Silas had this idea. And so we all talked about how this information needs to get out there. I don’t know if we have time to go through the process of writing a book and getting published, and trying to do all the stuff that you have to go through, as you you’re working on one yourself. It’s a huge timeline. You don’t just do it overnight. It takes a lot of time. So Silas and his studio, that’s how they came up, and they put together the BIPOC Design History Classes, went live January of 2021. And so again, it wasn’t the intent to have the classes. And that sort of happened first. That idea, we thought, prior to the pandemic and whatnot, that we would be working on a book first. So that happened. That was the success. And so then after the chorus, then we felt like, “Okay, now we have to write this book now, because we kind of already have a structure. We have content.” But little did we know, Maurice, that it was not that easy.

These small classes. Okay. Yeah. There are chapters in the book, but I don’t know. It’s just, yeah, they’re still talking to people. There’s still more research to be done. There’s still more archives to visit. So it wasn’t just that simple to just make that transition from the series of classes, and then to make it into a book. So we’re still in the process of writing now. We have a hard, hard deadline coming up on June 1st, where we have to really turn over the manuscript. And we’re all also collaborating on the design of the book, too. So yeah, it’s been an interesting process.

And I think the thing that, I know for me, and I think from my co-authors as well, the thing that’s been most difficult is that it’s a design history book, but we’re not approaching it like a Meg’s book in a way, or this book came out a few years ago, it’s called Graphic Design Pioneers, or Pioneers in Design, where it’s focused on individuals. So we do talk about individual designers and sort of their impact, but it’s more about the diaspora, it’s more about Black experience in a way, and what we had to go through and deal with. It’s more about how we’ve been represented through visual culture, and who’s responsible for that and that kind of stuff. So it’s not necessarily about a clothesline of designers, although we do talk about individual people, because you can’t write a history book without acknowledging individuals. But, it’s not just about highlighting people, I guess in that way. It’s more about the different movements that happened, throughout time and throughout history.

Maurice Cherry:
Yeah, because I mean-

Tasheka Arceneaux-Sutton:
And we’ve been affected by it, right?

Maurice Cherry:
Yeah. Because you’re, like you said, it’s set up with, it’s in the context of America during that time, and so there’s been wars, there’s been civil rights movements, there’s been other sorts of radical movements. And so, being able to talk about how Black design has been a through line with all of that in this country, we don’t learn it in school, in K through 12 schools. And based on what you’re saying, and probably from others, it’s probably not even something that’s really readily learned in colleges.

So having a book like this is super important, I think, not just to the design canon, but just like to American history in general. Because everything that we go through in this country has been designed in some capacity. That don’t necessarily mean that it’s been done with a pen and paper or in some visual aspect, but the systems of oppression that are in this country and many other things that sort of hold people back or push others forward, these are designed constructs. And so being able to talk about Black design in this country is super important to, I think, informing that for a lot of people. So, I’m excited to see the book when it comes out. Congratulations to you, because I know it’s a lot. I know all too well. Yeah.

Tasheka Arceneaux-Sutton:
I mean, I think writing a book is a challenge, in and of itself, but I think history, and I think we have a special challenge in the type of history that we’re trying to bring to light, because it hasn’t been well documented or readily available. So it’s a lot of things you have to do to discover these stories. That’s definitely been a challenge. I think, one thing that I want to say I’m proud of about how we approach the writing in this book is that we sort of try to do away with … we’re being ourselves. We feel like using I, then we use I. If we want to throw in a little snarky, something that maybe a long time ago would be unorthodox for a history book, but we are just throwing it and putting it all out there. We’re not sort of concerned about our voices being the same, and we like that our voices are fluid and they’re sort of interchangeable.

We collaborated and wrote the introduction together, and there are parts of it, it’s like, I don’t even remember what I wrote. And we do have our chapters that the three of us have been responsible for, and we have contributors to certain chapters as well, but we’re not sort of concerned with the more traditional approach to this type of book. We don’t even call it a textbook. We’re not really approaching it in that same traditional way, I guess, if you will.

Maurice Cherry:
Yeah. So you’re teaching, you’re running your own design studio, you are working on a book, you’re doing this research and your research focuses on, as we’ve talked about throughout this interview, Black people being omitted from the graphic design history canon. Given all the different spaces that you occupy, designer, educator, et cetera, what does the path forward look like for you?

Tasheka Arceneaux-Sutton:
I think about that a lot. I think it’s going to continue in this realm of writing and publishing, and designing. I think I like the idea of being a content generator and being the one to design that content. So I see more books around the same topic, but in different iterations. So for instance, I’m completely obsessed with Louise E. Jefferson. She is a Black woman who was one of the first art directors in the publishing industry at Friendship Press. She started working in the mid, late 1930s, and she was a designer, a calligrapher, a cartographer, an illustrator, a researcher. I mean, she was a real true renaissance woman, and she rubbed shoulders with all kinds of people during the Harlem Renaissance. But I’ve been doing research on her for a really long time. And so, I envision writing and designing a book about Louise E. Jefferson. And right now, I’ve been in touch with Friendship Press where she worked at as an art director for 20 years, and they’re interested in me writing a book about Louise and her work.

So those type of projects I see still continuing. The past few years have been great. The writing, the lecturing have been amazing, meeting amazing people, and have been great with giving me more opportunities to write into research. But I would like to hopefully, have more of a balance between that and my making, especially maybe even more so personal projects. I really enjoy doing small collaborations with other designers, whether it be zines or just random, creating compositions and giving files, going back and forth between digital files and things like that. Well, not really knowing what the outcome is. I think I just miss making and playing, and having fun.

Not that the design work that I do isn’t enjoyable, but it’s just a different type of making, I guess it’s different. You’re doing research and you’re writing. That’s a lot different than like, “Okay, I have this idea for making this thing using these materials, or even this tool or this technology. Am I making?” I’m really interested in this sort of synthesis, and analog and digital tools and how they sort of come together, and how to expand our uses in ways that they weren’t actually meant to be used. So I would like moving forward to be able to engage more, and just being a maker and not thinking about what I’m making so much.

Maurice Cherry:
Now, being a designer and an educator and all these things, you’ve talked now about how you want your path to go forward, but in your current work, how do you balance these different aspects? Do these different roles inform each other in some way?

Tasheka Arceneaux-Sutton:
Yeah, I mean, I definitely see there are so much overlap in … For a long time, I actually didn’t know how to bring all these things together, especially in the classroom because it took a while before I started teaching design history, and actually I’m not teaching it right now. I haven’t taught it in maybe three years. But I think, that doesn’t mean that I can’t still bring that into the classroom. So to me, it doesn’t matter. I don’t care that I’m not teaching design history. Whatever I’m teaching, you’re going to learn something about Black design. Some kind of way I’m going to insert my agenda, because I know that these are things that are, in part, it’s not just Black design history. I talk about queer history. I talk about other areas of design where people are marginalized or we don’t know a lot about, and I know a little something. I still try to impart that to my students, so I make sure that I’m trying to be equitable in that sense.

But yeah, I’m just starting to see where these roads and where these things are starting to overlap. So am I making? Now I think about, well, how could, besides designing books about Black design history or whatever, and the publishing aspect, but I start thinking about, well, what are other things that you can make that sort of has to do with your research? So I’m starting to think more about that, like timelines and things like that. So to me, the crossover is starting to happen. It’s slow and maybe not as fast as I would have liked them to be. And then I see them in the projects that I give to my students too. So it sort of reverts back to the classroom in that way.

Maurice Cherry:
So, I like that it all feeds into each other then. That’s good.

Tasheka Arceneaux-Sutton:
Kind of makes less work for me in a way, as opposed to try to compartmentalize everything. So for a long time, everything used to be in these separate buckets. Black design studio, freelance here is writing and lecture. But now, they’re just starting to morph together, and that has been good, and that’s how I would like things to continue in the future.

Maurice Cherry:
Hey, look, work smarter, not harder. I get it.

Tasheka Arceneaux-Sutton:
Exactly.

Maurice Cherry:
What advice would you give to someone out here that’s hearing your story, that’s hearing about all these different things that you’re interested in, and they want to follow in your footsteps? What would you tell them?

Tasheka Arceneaux-Sutton:
I would say, learn how to be comfortable in your voice, in your skin, and how to … I didn’t always feel comfortable being Tasheka, being authentically me, because sometimes I had moments where I didn’t want to step on people’s toes, but I noticed moments where I did do that, and I was just kind of myself and just kind of put it out there. Those have been the best experiences.

And I would say that we all have control. You have some kind of control over your path, and so if there’s a certain direction that you want your practice, or your craft, or your skill or whatever it is you are into to take, that you can kind of plan for. Talk to people who are doing the thing that you want to do, align yourself. Reach out to them. I know sometimes, we think and we look at people that we admire and we put them on this pedestal, but if they’re the right people, they’ll talk to you and they’re not full of themselves. And lots of times, people are more than happy to talk to you about your path, and this is especially to younger designers. Don’t be afraid to reach out to people who you admire, and have conversations with them about what they do and how they got to where they are. But yeah, I just say be bold.

Maurice Cherry:
Be bold.

Tasheka Arceneaux-Sutton:
Be bold and intentional about how you move through this world.

Maurice Cherry:
I love that. Where do you see yourself in the next five years? What do you want the next chapter of your story to be?

Tasheka Arceneaux-Sutton:
I do see myself still teaching. I do see myself still being at UT, and I’m hoping, my hope is that in five years, I have a couple of books under my belt by then. Maybe, I’m just going to throw it out there, Maurice. I would say at least three of them, because I have a list of projects that I’m really like. It’s kind of like these have to be done before I die. No, maybe they don’t have to be done in five years. That’s pretty ambitious of me, but I’m already working on one, so I can get the other two at least in the works by that time, that would be great.

I do have sort of a passion project that I’ve been sitting on on for a while. I have a collection of drawings, maybe it’s like 200 and something drawings, that I would like in five years to have their own sort of brand, where it’s a collection of, whether it’s greeting cards or home decor or apparel. Not or. I should say and. So I’ve been procrastinated on this project for a really long time, and I hope in five years that that project sort of sees the light of day.

Maurice Cherry:
Well, just to wrap things up here, where can our audience find out more information about you, about your work and everything? Where can they find that online?

Tasheka Arceneaux-Sutton:
I’m probably most active on Instagram and Facebook. So Facebook is Tasheka Arceneaux-Sutton. On Instagram, it’s Blacvoice. I am on Twitter under Blacvoice, but I’m not that engaged with that platform as much. But, I’m on there and I tweet every now and then. I’m on LinkedIn, which is, you can find me under Tasheka Arceneaux-Sutton. Again, that’s not a platform that I’m super engaged in, but I’m there, and you’ll probably find me multiple times under LinkedIn, but I’m there. But Instagram, I would say, it’s probably the place to see me. I’m more active there. I would hate to throw out my crappy Adobe Portfolio website. That’s just a bunch of stuff that’s thrown on there right now. But hey, why not? Blacvoicedesign.portfolio.com. That’s just something that’s there right now, just to have an online presence, until I have time to do something else with it.

Maurice Cherry:
All right. Sounds good. Tasheka Arceneaux-Sutton, I want to thank you so, so much for coming on the show. You and your work have been on my radar for many years, I think probably, maybe since 2015? For a while now. And it wasn’t until recently, I had spoken with Cheryl, had Cheryl on the show for 500th episode, and she sung your praises to the high heavens. And I was like, “I feel like I reached out to her before. Let me reach out again just to see if she might be interested.”

Tasheka Arceneaux-Sutton:
Actually, you did, Maurice. I thought about that. I was actually just telling my sister right before, and I was like, I feel weird because you did reach out to me a long time ago, and I think at the time I was just not ready, and something that had nothing to do with you or the show. I love the show and listen to it, and I think that was just like, “I’m still in my boldness. I’m kind of shy too, and more of an introvert.” So I think that, yeah, it just took a while, but you did. You did, but I’m glad you reached back out again.

Maurice Cherry:
Yeah, but I mean, I also just want to say from hearing your story and hearing about everything that you’re working on, I think it’s evident that you have a passion for design. You have a passion for honestly getting the story right, whether it’s through writing, through education, through your visual design work. I’m really excited to see and hear more from you in the future. I feel like you’re one of our bright shining stars that are really going to help represent us, as we move forward in this crazy world that we’re in right now. I feel like the work that you’re doing is really going to stand out and help showcase what Black designers are doing everywhere, so thank you so much for coming on the show. I appreciate it.

Tasheka Arceneaux-Sutton:
Thanks again for having me, Maurice.

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Morgan Bissant

I had to connect with Morgan Bissant after seeing a few of her images of 90s sitcoms make the rounds on Twitter. Her work definitely captures to the richness of the Black experience, and she’s done everything from editorial work for Comcast to children’s illustrations and book covers. But that’s not all!

Morgan and I talked about some of her big freelance projects, and she spoke on how Black pop culture, especially animation, is a big source of inspiration and her creative process. We also discussed how she stays up on trends in the industry, how she handles burnout, and she gave us a look into her current art journey and creative process. Morgan’s experiences and raw talent are a unique combination, and I think we’ll definitely see more of her amazing work in the future!

Interview Transcript

Maurice Cherry:
All right, so tell us who you are and what you do.

Morgan Bissant:
My name is Morgan Bissant. I am a graphic designer and illustrator. I do a lot of branding work. I do a lot of layout design, I do web design, but something that I’ve always been more passionate about is illustration and I’ve been doing illustration work since I was old enough to hold a pencil. Currently, I’ve been doing a lot of illustration work for different companies and publishers. I’ve been working on children’s books, I’ve been doing promotional material. That’s something that I’ve really enjoyed doing. I enjoy being able to actually use my craft, I guess, in bigger spaces.

Maurice Cherry:
Nice. It sounds like it keeps you pretty busy.

Morgan Bissant:
Yes, it’s a lot. It definitely takes up a lot of time.

Maurice Cherry:
How has this year been going so far?

Morgan Bissant:
So far it’s been going pretty good. I’ve actually started a new full-time job probably a couple months back, I want to say. I started a new full-time job doing graphic design work and I work at a marketing agency called OrthoSynetics. It’s been nice being able to do a lot of different things. In my previous job, we designed a lot of baby products, and in this job we do a lot of different marketing products. So, we’ll do flyers, we’ll do social posts, we’ll do websites. I was able to work on a major branding project for a new doctor that we picked up for our agency, and that’s all been pretty exciting. It’s really different from what I’m used to doing. It’s a much faster pace than some of my earlier jobs and projects, but it’s been a lot of fun. I like being able to do a lot of different things.

Maurice Cherry:
Nice.

Morgan Bissant:
Keeps me interested.

Maurice Cherry:
Congratulations on the new job.

Morgan Bissant:
Thank you so much.

Maurice Cherry:
Do you have any plans for the summer? Anything coming up?

Morgan Bissant:
Not necessarily. I’m just seeing what may be over the horizon maybe. So, I’ve currently been working on doing some freelance projects and I’m just always trying to keep myself open to seeing if I could get some other things, follow up with those. I’m always trying to see what other opportunities that I may have and other work that I can take on.

Maurice Cherry:
Now, I saw back in September last year that you had did some work for Comcast for their Black History Month series, which ran this year. Can you tell me a little bit about that?

Morgan Bissant:
Yeah, sure. So, actually it ran last year. I ended up reposting it because I’m pretty proud of it, so I’m going to keep sharing it. So, this was something that we worked on last year. It was a partnership that they reached out to me for. I had initially gotten their attention because I had seen one of their ads on Twitter and it was something for the Olympic Games, and I saw there was this little black girl and she was looking at the screen in awe and seeing the black athletes doing all kind of stuff, and she was just so amazed and everything. And I just thought she was just so cute and I was like, “I just have to draw this little girl because she’s adorable.” And so I went ahead and illustrated how she looked in the ad and I figured out I would just post it and tag them, because why not?

And they ended up seeing it and they really liked what they saw. And so I want to say a couple months down the line, they reached out to me and they said, “Hey, we’re doing this campaign for Black History Month, and we really loved the artwork that you tagged us in on Twitter. So, we wanted you to do something actually in partnership with us this time in celebration of Black History Month.” And that was pretty exciting. So, they asked me to do a couple of different illustrations. The first two that they asked for, they wanted some illustrations of Erin Jackson and Elana Meyers Taylor for the Winter games.

They followed up and they said that they wanted to do something else, something I guess a little bit more Black History Month specific. They wanted to do the McDonogh Three. I know a lot of people aren’t exactly aware of who those are, and that is three little girls that desegregated McDonogh 19 in New Orleans in the 1960s. And that was something I was really excited about doing, because being from New Orleans, that was something a bit more personal for me. Them doing that, desegregating schools is what gave me the opportunities that I had growing up, and that was something that I really was excited to do.

So, I was over the moon about that part of it, and I went through everything to put the illustrations together and they wanted two separate illustrations, so they wanted to show, I guess, a parallel of the past and show them as little girls, and one in the present. So, just showing them how they are now and I guess illustrating how far they’ve come over the years and what their sacrifices meant to people, and also to show that these women are still alive today. And a lot of people always think that, “Well that happened so long ago, and everybody that was involved in that is probably gone and all of that is over,” but they’re still here. They’re still here to tell the stories, and they’re still here to push a lot of the, I guess I want to say, push a lot of what was hidden, a lot of the things that were lost historically because a lot of people know about Ruby Bridges, but a lot of people also don’t know about them.

Maurice Cherry:
Yeah. I mean there’s a lot of layers to that, that I think is really cool. One that Comcast saw an illustration that you did and they were like, “Oh, this is great. Can you do some work for us?” I feel like you hear those sorts of things sometimes is being discovered out of nowhere things, but I think that’s really cool that they just picked up on some work that you put online and they really wanted to keep working with it. I think that was great, but also the levels of being able to do something that’s tied to history, especially civil rights history in this country as people from this podcast.

Now, I’m from Selma, Alabama, so I grew up in that cradle of the civil rights movement, and there are so many stories about things that have happened that we knew about, the bigger things we knew about the March to Montgomery, as you mentioned, we know about Ruby Bridges, but we don’t know about some of these lesser known stories and struggles and triumphs that have happened.

And so I think it’s great that you were able to create some work that shone a light on that and to let people know that while this is “history,” it’s also the present. Like you said, these women are still alive, so the fact that they are still here and that they fought for these rights is something that we should all be aware of.

Morgan Bissant:
Yes, it’s always good to make sure you’re informed. And it’s always good to be able to put more things out there and shine light on things that we don’t know about, because there’s just so much stuff that we didn’t learn in school and just so many things in general that just get overlooked in favor of just those little three big figures like Rosa Parks and Martin Luther King. I mean nothing’s wrong with learning about them obviously.

Maurice Cherry:
Right.

Morgan Bissant:
But it’s sad that that’s all most people really know about and they barely know about them either.

Maurice Cherry:
Well, I think it’s also telling that, in the past, media was really the thing that brought the whole civil rights movement to the nation. I mean because a lot of these things were happening in small southern towns, et cetera, and it wasn’t, I think until the incidents of, I think it was Bloody Sunday that happened in Selma. It wasn’t until those incidents where there were actually cameras and then that footage got broadcast across the nation that people saw about it. So, in a way, you can see how there’s a lot of stories and things that happen that we just don’t know about. Parts of history that get covered up.

I think people are just starting to really know about, for example, Bayard Rustin or Claudette Colvin, and people have mentioned Martin Luther King Jr. and Rosa Parks, but not these other people that were behind the scenes maybe, or that did the work that they did before they did. So, a lot of those stories, it’s interesting, are now also being uncovered through media. I think within the past, I’d say at least in the past 10 years, I’ve seen so many black creators unearth a lot of these stories through animation, through illustration, et cetera. I think it’s really great. It’s really great.

Morgan Bissant:
Yeah, that’s always something exciting to see.

Maurice Cherry:
Yeah. Let’s talk more about your work as a freelance illustrator. You mentioned that you’re also working full-time at this agency OrthoSynetics. What does a regular day look like for you right now?

Morgan Bissant:
With working full-time, that gets a lot of my time. Basically what we do is we have a certain amount of projects that we have to get done throughout the day, and it’s generally a nine to five situation, and so we’ll have certain things that we’ll work on. We might have banners that we might have to do, we might have billboards, but it basically varies from day-to-day what we might have to work on. The things that we do are mainly for orthodontists and dentist, and that’s just a lot of what we see.

We might have flyers advertising different prices for dental work or different offers or things along those lines. So, that’s basically what we have our eyes on throughout the day. Now, as far as doing any freelance work, I have to put that, I guess, on the tail end of my day or reserve that for the weekends because we’re generally just so busy with doing graphic design work at the agency that sometimes it can be a little tough to juggle. But generally speaking, when I do get freelance projects, I’m given a sufficient amount of time to complete them. So, it’s not like I have to do everything at work and then come rush home and then just rush and get a book cover done in five minutes.

So, I’ll have months and months to work on things and get things done, and I’ll do that in my free time that I have. Sometimes I’ll work on things while I’m listening to music or while I’m watching a TV show that I enjoy to motivate me or I guess help me to get into a groove. It just helps to do it when I have, I guess, some breathing room to do so, which again, with the deadlines, it does help to give me some breathing room to actually get a lot of these projects done, and I try not to take on too much at a time so that I won’t be overbooked.

Maurice Cherry:
I mean that’s a good thing. I know that you’re represented by an agency, which we’ll talk about a little bit later. I imagine your agent knows that too. So, when you’re getting booked for things, you can’t do something last minute, there has to be some buffer time around it for you to be able to get it done.

Morgan Bissant:
Yeah. They have different industry standards on what is appropriate for different projects. Now sometimes people will come and be like, “Hey, we need you to get this done in two days,” which I mean, it’s really ultimately up to you on whether or not you want to take it with not enough time to get it done. But generally speaking, for larger projects especially, you definitely need a sufficient amount of time to finish things. And especially in a creative space, you don’t want to be pushed to the limit and be getting yourself burnt out when you’re trying to come up with ideas that look good and are executed well. I always try to do things that are within my means. Now, if it’s something like maybe smaller and it might be a little bit of rush, I just feel like I have time and I feel like I might be able to do it, I might grab it. But usually if it’s a little too tight, I might ask for more time or I might have just have to pass on that one.

Maurice Cherry:
Right. Now, I’m looking through your website now. I see of course you’ve done illustration work, but there’s logo design work here. You’ve done book illustrations, character designs, all of it is really great, and I mentioned this to you right before we started recording that I saw your work on Twitter because you had done this character lineup of the main cast from Living Single. And I mean the style of it was so good. I was like, “I have to reach out to her to see if she can come on the podcast.” Are you influenced a lot by TV and pop culture in your work?

Morgan Bissant:
I am. That actually is what pushed me to start drawing, and that’s really what made me want to do it more seriously. Pop culture is a huge part of it, especially things that are immersed in black culture. Obviously me being black, that’s my own culture and it’s something that I can pull inspiration from my personal experiences. Things like anime and cartoons, they’ve always fueled my desire for illustration. I’ve always been influenced by things like Sailor Moon and Dragon Ball Z and things like that. Growing up, I was very small and watching a lot of these programs, and that’s what made me want to draw. I started copying things that I saw while I was watching TV. I would be watching Sailor Moon in the mornings and I’d said, “Well, I want to draw Sailor Moon.” And so I would be working until I got her to what I felt was right and was an accurate depiction of what she looked like on the screen.

And as I got older and I started cultivating my talents and working on my skills, started trying to branch off and do other things. And I’ve always tried to start creating my own concepts and characters, and nowadays I am still heavily influenced by anime and animation in general, but a lot of other things that I was exposed to like different black sitcoms and cartoons, that also had an impact on my overall style. Bruce W. Smith has always been one of my huge inspirations for illustration work. I’ve always liked his style since The Proud Family and Bรฉbรฉ’s Kids, Happily Ever After, Fairy Tales for Every Child.

That always was a draw to me. And I’ve mimicked some of my style and my character designs around some of the things that he’s done, and I mean he isn’t one of the only influences that I have, but that’s always something that I’ve seen growing up, and I’ve always liked his style and I’ve always wanted to, I guess, put a little bit of that into my style. And so nowadays I have this, I guess, combination of all of these different influences that have created what I have today.

Maurice Cherry:
Well, talk to me about how you approach a new project. What does your creative process look like when a new project comes across your table?

Morgan Bissant:
So, for basically any new project that I have, whether it just be freelance or something personal, I always try to brainstorm first. I might write down ideas or just sketch things down, and I just try to just do things and just get my brain going. I don’t always have something in mind before I start sketching, so I have this approach where I’ll just start doing anything. Well, not anything, but I’ll start trying to draw different things and just see where it takes me and then try to give myself a couple of different options and variations in what I might want to do with it, and then just see where it goes from there. This is especially true for larger projects, because I definitely have to see where I’m going before I start tackling something so huge.

So, I always have to sketch things out first. I always have to get ideas down first, and if I have any troubles or bumps in the road, I might go online. I have my Pinterest, I have all these bookmarks and stuff on Instagram. I have all these bookmarks on Twitter of different photographs or screenshots or fashion or just whatever, and I might use that as a way to, I guess, give myself a little bit of inspiration so I can push myself in the right direction. Because sometimes I can’t always come up with things just immediately from the top of my head.

So, it helps for me to look at some things. It helps for me to continuously draw things until I can get some ideas to come out that I like. I always try to keep things in my back pocket that I can always pull up later in terms of references and images that I might have saved that I think that I could probably use going forward for my creative process.

Maurice Cherry:
Was there ever a really particularly hard design or illustration that you had to create for a project?

Morgan Bissant:
I think that probably one of the hardest things that I have worked on in recent years would be probably the illustration that I did for the Crescent City Sneaker Ball. It was both illustration and it was a graphic designed invitation, and I’m really happy with how it came out, but there was a lot of thought that had to go into it, and there was a lot that I had to consider like, “Okay, how is this going to work? How can I fit this in here?” Because it was a little bit different from what I usually do. Everything was a collage and I had to make sure all the pieces fit together and flowed together and had to make sure things didn’t look too cluttered or too structured. So, it took a lot of working around with that one and playing around with it to make it work.

But I think ultimately all things considered, it came out pretty cute. It was a lot to think about. It was a lot to figure out how everything should go and everything should work together. I’m also really not too fantastic with buildings, or at least I personally don’t feel like I’m all that great with them. And that had a lot of structures in it. I like drawing people more. That’s always been my thing. I’ve always liked drawing characters, so structures and boats and street cars and stuff, I’ve never really done a lot of that. And that added to the challenge. So, executing that, it was a lot for me, but ultimately I’m glad I took that on. I thought it came out pretty nice, all things considered.

Maurice Cherry:
Do you have any upcoming projects that you can talk about? Anything you’re excited about?

Morgan Bissant:
I don’t know if this would be considered upcoming, but the book that I have recently illustrated for Lamar Giles that is going to be coming out next month, and I’m actually pretty excited about that one. So, I mean, I don’t know if I would call that an upcoming project because I’ve already finished it, but we haven’t gotten the printed books yet. And so I’m honestly very excited to see how it will come out on paper, because I’ve seen what it looks like on my computer, but I want to see it in book form. It’s just an entirely new feeling you get when you actually see your work just tangible and you can hold it in your hand and on a professional level, because you can print out your own stuff at Office Depot or something, but it’s not the same as this is a book that’s going to be in Barnes & Noble.

It’s almost so weird because I never thought that I would ever get to this point in my life where I would actually be seeing my name on the cover of children’s books or seeing the book actually in store somewhere. So, that’s pretty cool and I’m excited to actually get some copies of it.

Maurice Cherry:
Nice. I mean I think it’s always an accomplishment when something you do makes it on a book or a magazine or something like that, because it’s so finite. Things that are on the web can get redesigned or deleted or moved or stuff like that. But a book or a magazine or something like that, that’s permanent.

Morgan Bissant:
It’s exciting. Like he said, it’s not the same. I mean you can post all your stuff on Instagram and I mean nothing’s wrong with that or anything. It’s great to have your stuff out there, but it’s totally different to go outside and see your work there at the store and other people actually see it. And people that might not even have Instagram or Twitter, they can see your work, and people that are working in these industries, they can actually see your work. And that’s almost like an out of body experience sometimes thinking about it.

Maurice Cherry:
Yeah. It’s a really big deal. It’s a big deal. I think it’s a big deal. I want to get more into your work and your career, but before that, I want to learn more just about you. As you mentioned earlier, you’re a New Orleans native. Tell me about growing up in New Orleans. Did you do a lot of creative stuff as a kid?

Morgan Bissant:
I did. I don’t know if that necessarily had to do a lot with me living in New Orleans, I did have a lot of opportunities to be creative growing up. We did have a lot of stuff at our schools where we could paint murals and things on the walls. I had this one art teacher in elementary school, Mr. Baldwin, and he had all of the art students paint this, I guess, prehistoric scene of all the dinosaurs on the cafeteria wall, and I thought that was so much fun. I wish I could do more things like that. I just always liked collaborative types of projects and things that were always, I guess, larger than life, at least to me. Because like I was saying before with the book, it’s different when everybody can see it like that. And I think as a child, that really pushed the importance of artwork to me because it didn’t just trivialize it as this little hobby that kindergartners do when they draw with crayon on paper and things like that.

It actually took our craft seriously and it encouraged us to pursue what we were doing. It gave a credence to art, and I think that that’s always important for little kids that enjoy that stuff. I think that it’s always important to encourage what they’re doing because that’s something that needs to be fostered, that’s something that needs to be developed. And if it’s something that they really enjoy and that they want to go forward with it, I don’t see why you shouldn’t encourage it and give them opportunities to push them and put their work out there.

Maurice Cherry:
Was your family really supportive of you going in that route?

Morgan Bissant:
Yeah, they always have been. So, like I was saying before, I’ve been drawing since I was able to pick up a pencil. I don’t remember this, but this is what my mom told me, so this is what I have to go off of. So, I have just always been drawing things and I guess the things that I was drawing were a little bit more developed than what the average toddler would do, and I guess I was showing that I was able to pick up different forms more than somebody that would have that natural inclination. As I got older, my drawings started getting a little bit more developed, and as I was watching cartoons, I was drawing the cartoons that I saw on TV, and they weren’t exactly stick figures. I always tried to get them as close as I possibly can with the skills that I had at three years old.

And as I got older, my parents, they noticed what I had and they put me in different programs. They tried to get me in talented art classes at school, and they always wanted to give me a chance to grow as an artist, and they always encouraged what I did. They always saw what I had, they saw the talent that I had, and they always wanted to encourage me to continue doing it and to pursue it. And eventually I ended up pursuing that as a full-time thing. Now, graphic design is different from a illustration, but it’s still a form of art, and that’s something that they never stopped me from doing it. They were like, “No, don’t do this. Be a lawyer.” They wanted me to do what I enjoyed doing, and I’m really grateful for that, that I always had a supportive family that always pushed me to do what would make me happy.

Maurice Cherry:
And I mean, graphic design is a gateway into I think a lot of different just visual designs. I mean back in the day I think it was all just called communication design, and then it splintered off into advertising. And then I think especially with the advent of the personal computer and Photoshop and stuff like that, it became desktop publishing and then it was graphic design. So, it’s a gateway into a lot of different things. I mean, as you mentioned, you really wanted to do it enough to the point where you ended up studying it. You went to Louisiana State University, majored in graphic design there. How was your time there at the school?

Morgan Bissant:
I really liked the time that I had, because they gave us a lot of time to explore a lot of different things. So, with the curriculum that we had, which it was basically called fine arts, the entire degree itself, they gave us opportunities to do a lot of different mediums of art. Your primary major would be graphic design, and that was what was ultimately the focus. But we had classes where we could illustrate, where we could paint. If we wanted to, we could explore photography, we could explore welding and print making.

So, they gave us a lot of different mediums and avenues that we can dip our feet in and see how we liked it, or we could even use those things to apply them to graphic design in a way. So, myself, I’ve always been interested in illustration. I always wanted to put illustration in my graphic design work, and so when we took a lot of illustration classes there, it also helped me to develop my style and pay attention to a lot of things that maybe I might have been overlooking.

So, it helped me to improve my craft overall when I took illustration classes. And I could always bring that back into graphic design where I could maybe draw characters and now my characters look more refined, or I could draw different symbols, and now everything looks a little better, it looks sharper and it looks more professional. And that’s something that I’ve always liked. So, I don’t know exactly how every other school tackles this degree, but I really did like that about it, because it gave us a lot of different options to go in. You weren’t exactly forced to do all of them. So, I was never really huge on photography. So, I didn’t do photography, but I had another option.

If instead I wanted to do painting, or I wanted to do sculpture making, I could do one of those. And that’s something that I really appreciated. It gave us a lot of different things that we could go into, and I felt like that helped me in the long run because while it gave me a graphic design degree, which helped me getting a full-time job, it also helped me in terms of art in general, because all of those illustration classes, they helped me in terms of anatomy and in terms of composition and things like that, that you can use that in graphic design, but ultimately you could use that in illustration too, because that’s a lot of what I do.

Maurice Cherry:
I mean it sounds like the program was really expansive to allow you to just try out a lot of different things and see what you liked the best.

Morgan Bissant:
Yeah, they gave us a lot to work with, and that was just a lot of, I don’t know if you would call them collectives, but they weren’t exactly our core classes. They were just things that you can pick to add on to what you were doing. And even within graphic design, we still had a lot of things that they gave us that we could explore, like typography and making different graphic symbols and things like that. So, we always had a huge variety, which that was great, honestly, for all of us. Because a lot of people, they branched off and did other things and they found that taking this drawing class, it’s like, “Well, now I want to do books.” Or “I took this photography class and now I want to do photography and I want to do events.” And that was always something that I felt was influenced by the fact that we had all of these options.

And I always thought it was really great, and it made the curriculum a lot more fun. I always liked drawing. I always had fun drawing. So, being able to take all these drawing classes, it was nice. And then it gave me a little bit more of an outlet, because graphic design isn’t always about drawing. Sometimes it’s about laying out things, and sometimes it can get a little bit monotonous, especially if it’s all for school projects and things. But if you have time to go on the side and go draw a polar bear or a bowl of fruit, and that’s something that you enjoy doing, it can make your time in school more enjoyable.

Maurice Cherry:
Yeah. So, when you graduated, did you have an idea lined up about what you wanted to do next?

Morgan Bissant:
I honestly was not exactly sure, but at the same time, I actually already had an opportunity lined up for me before I even graduated.

Maurice Cherry:
Oh, okay.

Morgan Bissant:
So, a couple of months before I graduated, me and a few other students had gotten recruited by a local business called Impression Works, where we did photo books and greeting cards and things like that, and we could basically do whatever we felt like worked. So, it didn’t always have to be layout stuff. If we wanted to put illustrations in them, we could, and it gave us a little bit of creative freedom. And that was nice to be able to have during school, because it was a bit of a safety net in terms of having a job when I graduated. But then on top of that, I had a little bit of income coming in while I was in school, and it was flexible because we could do most of our work from home.

So, I was able to just work on projects for work in my free time, and we were still interns/part-time, so we weren’t totally overloaded with things where we couldn’t balance homework and senior projects and work work. And that ended up working out for a little while. And then it was a contract job, so once the contract was up after that, I had to try to turn around and try to find something else as soon as I could. And I wasn’t exactly sure how that was going to work out, because with me being pretty illustration oriented, I wasn’t sure how I would’ve liked something that didn’t really allow me to do that. And I know that a lot of graphic design jobs don’t really have a heavy focus on that. And so I was always wondering, “Well, will I be able to fit into another job somewhere or at a real firm?”

Because I really didn’t do a whole lot of layout at the time, and I didn’t have a whole lot of that in my portfolio outside of a couple of school projects. So, I was wondering how that was going to work out. And I ended up landing another full-time job at a company called Sassy Baby. That was a place where we got to design a lot of baby products. So, we would draw the little characters that were on bibs and bath products, and there were a couple little toys and stuff, we designed teethers and things like that. And that actually worked out in terms of capturing the, I guess, the niche that I am in, because being a graphic designer and an illustrator isn’t always… it is I guess. A lot of people who are graphic designers, they’re not illustrators, and a lot of illustrators are not graphic designers.

So, I guess I felt like I was different in that sense. But that job that I found, it ended up working out pretty well because I got to draw cute little characters. And we also had to do a lot of graphic design, we had to do a lot of layout things, we had to do a lot of presentation materials. So, graphic design of course helped me in those aspects. But being an illustrator helped me in terms of being able to capture different likenesses of little bears and bunnies and things like that. That was a pretty nice job, because we got a lot of tangible products out of it. You’d go in Walmart and you’d see the bibs that you designed. You’d see the little patterns of characters and things that you did, and you could go to Target or Meijer or wherever, and you could see the work that you’ve done, and you’d see it on full display for people to buy. And that was always cool. And it was always rewarding in a sense, to see your work.

Maurice Cherry:
I’m so glad that you said that about a graphic designer’s not an illustrator. Illustrator’s not a graphic designer, because I feel like sometimes, and this is really from the company standpoint, they just think it’s all the same. They think as long as you can do something in design, that you can do everything in design. So, I’m glad you qualified that by saying that.

Morgan Bissant:
Yeah, I’ve seen a lot of mix ups with that. I will see a lot of illustrators that I follow get all of these requests for, “Hey, can you do logos?” And I’m just like that’s not the same thing. Just because they can draw Goku does not mean they can give you a professional looking logo for your law firm. This is two totally different forms of art. It’s an important distinction.

Maurice Cherry:
No, it’s an important distinction. And I think it’s good to stick by that, because I think early in your career you want to be able to do any work that comes your way because you want to be able to prove yourself as a creative. So, even if you are, say for example, really good at illustration and someone says, “Well, can you do a logo?” You’re thinking, “Well, I mean it’s a drawing. I can do that.” But I think it’s good that you’re sticking by saying, “No, I only do illustration. This is what I do. I can’t do this other thing that you’re asking for.”

I mean you probably could technically do it because the skills are transferrable, but I think it’s good to stick by that because what it does is it strengthens your particular craft in that area. So, people eventually don’t get it confused. But I feel like that’s pretty common early on though. You try to do a little bit of everything, one, to see what you can do, and two, because the work just comes your way.

Morgan Bissant:
Yeah. And I get that, especially if you’re just starting out and you’re like, “I don’t have any projects and this guy is asking me for a logo, so I’m just going to take it because I need the money.” But if that’s not what you do, you don’t want to end up getting saddled with that your whole life, trying to struggle to do something that you know you don’t enjoy doing and you don’t exactly, I guess, have the equipment for. Because you can definitely do a logo that’s a drawing. But I mean if this super corporate firm is asking you for a super corporate logo and you draw just characters or buildings and things like that, it’s not always going to transfer well.

You don’t exactly have, I guess, that same know-how or that same eye to capture what they might want. So, I like to make sure people know that there’s a difference, because every illustrator that you try to ask for a work from is not going to be equipped to give you what you need, because illustration and graphic design aren’t the same thing. And I feel like a lot of people just think, “Oh, art is art,” but that’s just not how it is.

Maurice Cherry:
Right. Now you’re represented by Inkyverse, which is a agency. They rep a lot of animators, artists, authors. How did you go about getting representation? Did they come to you? Did you seek them out? How did that work?

Morgan Bissant:
They actually came to me. I believe they found me on Instagram, I want to say. So, it was, I think not too long after I had posted this graphic that I did. It was the Salt Girl, the Salt of the Earth thing that I did. And that went viral, and I think that’s what got me noticed by the agency. They reached out to me, they actually sent me a text because I had my number on my resume and they were like, “Hey, this is Inkyverse and we are looking to see if you would be interested in commercial art representation.” And then I followed up with, “This is not a scam, this is real?” Like okay.

I was like, “Well, thank God for clarifying.” I sure was about to just block the number. They said that they would keep in touch with me, and we ended up having a conversation over the phone. The agent that I was speaking to, Katrina, she was going over everything that having an agent entailed and how having an agent can help you find high profile clients and they can help you to establish rates for yourself and they can basically just manage you. And I was like, “That sounds pretty good to me. So, I mean I don’t see why I would say no personally.” I mean I never was really good with managing everything that I had. I was always really bad with trying to figure out rates that I wanted to charge for myself. So, I mean I was like, “Well, I’ll go for it.”

I mean the worst that could happen is that I might not like it and I can just say I don’t want to do it anymore. So far it’s really been a blessing to have an agent and work with Inkyverse, because having a lot of these major companies reach out to me, not having an agent would have been terrifying because I would not know what to say. I would not know what money to ask for. I wouldn’t know how to fight back against that, because especially if you’re pretty green, it’s like you don’t want to say the wrong thing and be like, “Oh my gosh, I just ruined this entire opportunity because I have asked them for the wrong amount or I said the wrong thing, or whatever.”

So, it really helped to have somebody, I guess, go back and forth on my behalf that actually knows the industry and actually knows the standards and actually knows what to ask for, what is fair. That’s been a huge help in getting me fair rates for projects, for getting the amount of time that I would get for things. I mean it’s been good to have somebody to look over contracts and things and make sure nothing weird is in them before I sign them. And that’s something that I really like having and I would definitely recommend other artists do so if it is at all possible to have somebody to, I guess, be your help where you need it.

Maurice Cherry:
Yeah, I mean I’ve had other illustrators on the show before that are also represented by agents and they’ve talked about how it just helps them to focus on the work. They don’t have to handle all the administrative emails and contracts and all this stuff. They can just focus on doing the work when it comes in, and it’s just such a big benefit for them. And it’s really cool that they reached out to you, they saw your work and wanted you to be a part of what they’re building.

Morgan Bissant:
Yeah, and I was honestly really blown away by that. I was, “Really? Me? How did you even get here?” It was really exciting. I was like, “I can’t believe you would want me to do this.” And then even more so with the random text, I was like, “Are we sure this isn’t a scam and you’re not going to ask me for my credit card number next? I feel like this is too good to be true.” But it was really nice to be able to have somebody who works in that industry say, “Hey, we think your work is so good and that it can make a whole bunch of money, so we want you here.” Not to say that my representative is just like, “Hey, we just want you for the money,” because I didn’t want it to sound like that, but it’s nice to know that your artwork is appreciated in a professional sense.

Maurice Cherry:
Right. How do you stay up to date with the latest design and illustration trends? Like you mentioned pop culture being a big part of your work, pop culture and television. How do you stay up to date with trends in the industry?

Morgan Bissant:
I personally would say that I try to do somewhat of a research. I don’t know if I could 100% call it research. Well, I guess I could, yeah. I try to research some things when I have time to do so. At my previous job for graphic design, we always used different magazines and publications and even Pinterest to stay up to date with what was trending and what was up-to-date and designs that we can pull from that won’t look dated. And I do use that to a certain degree when it comes to illustration work, but I also do like to look into a lot of fashion.

I follow a lot of fashion bloggers and I’m always looking at things on TikTok and stuff like that, because that’s always been an influence on my style as well. I like drawing illustrations that incorporate a lot of fashion. I like looking at different, I guess, design when it comes to fashion on TV or in movies or things like that. I try to pay attention to those things and pay attention to, I guess, what is out now and what I could probably see in the future.

Maurice Cherry:
What would you say is one of the newer trends right now?

Morgan Bissant:
You mean in terms of fashion?

Maurice Cherry:
Well, I mean like, yeah, I guess in general, as you look at it as to how you might apply it to your work, do you see any trends that you’re like, “Oh, I might want to try that out?”

Morgan Bissant:
Honestly, I’ve been looking at a whole lot of fashion.

Maurice Cherry:
Well, I mean fashion could be that inspiration, it sounds like.

Morgan Bissant:
Sometimes I look at a lot of just things that I see just online, and it doesn’t have to be anything in particular, but if I feel like something is particularly striking, I might pull some inspiration from it, from what I see on there. I guess as of right now, I’ve been liking a lot of, I want to say suits and things in that general area. That’s always been something that’s been drawing my attention. I don’t know if that is exactly the trendiest thing overall now in terms of I guess business and things like that. I’ve seen a lot of people doing those kinds of things on TikTok and whatever. That’s always something that I wanted to incorporate in some of my illustrations as well. Now, in terms of now, I wouldn’t say a pulling a whole lot of things from now in particular, or some things that are trendy now.

Maurice Cherry:
How would you say that your style as an illustrator and a designer has evolved over the years?

Morgan Bissant:
I have definitely gained a better understanding of composition, and I want to say anatomy and layout. Basically everything that I worked on, I feel like it has elevated. I feel like I’ve really grown to have a better understanding of what works and how things should look, how I can utilize the different spaces of things and create, I guess, a better and more fluent composition. I also feel that I’ve grown in the sense where I’ve been able to refine how my characters look. I went really back and forth with a lot of different styles and trying to figure out what worked and trying to figure out how I should paint things and should I do things that are really stylistic? Should I do things that are realistic? It’s always been experimental and trying to figure out how I want things to look overall and what I felt worked for me.

And I think I’ve found, I guess, a good middle ground of how I want my illustrations and how I want my designs to look. But I think just having more of a knowledge of shapes and color and growing in those areas has really helped my design and illustration work to flourish. And I have also accepted the fact that everything is not always going to look the same. So, I know a lot of artists have a particular style. I know a lot of people, including myself, have always felt like you should just have one style and that should be it, and you shouldn’t really do anything else. As I’ve grown, I’ve learned that you could just do whatever you want. I mean if I want to do something realistic one day, I can do that. If I want to do something stylized another day, I can do that.

That doesn’t necessarily mean that I don’t have a style, and it doesn’t mean that I don’t know what I’m doing. It just happens. You might want to experiment, you might just want to do something different. I mean I think that that really just shows that you just have a lot to offer as an artist. I mean it just shows that you have the skill to be able to go back and forth and do a variety of things. And I don’t think anything’s wrong with that, which unfortunately a lot of people still feel that way. But I think that I would always encourage artists to just do what you enjoy doing. If you want to do a lot of different things, I say go for it, as long as you’re not burning yourself out.

Maurice Cherry:
Well, I guess speaking of that, how do you handle those periods when you might be burnt out or you might just have low motivation? How do you handle that?

Morgan Bissant:
So, overall I try to just take breaks in between my work. I try not to rush things, and I always am pretty careful about not overbooking myself, especially keeping in mind that I do have a full-time job and I’m trying to juggle freelance and whatever else I have. I always want to make sure I’m trying to gauge my time properly and see what I actually have room to do, because I don’t want to get to that point where I’m just like I’m completely just worn out and I just can’t do anything. I think that it’s very important to take breaks when you can. I always try to set aside some time or a day or whatever to just do nothing or just have fun or maybe watch a movie or play a game or just something, something not work related. But there have been times where I just didn’t have a choice.

I just had to power through something. And I felt like what just motivated me to get it done is just to try to have as much fun with it as possible. There’s been projects that I’ve worked on and I just try to, I guess, put a little bit of myself into it and just use that as a way to express myself, which wasn’t exactly discouraged in the project. And that helped me to, I guess, think of the project that I had to work on or something that was just more fun, something that I could enjoy. Not thinking about it as, “I have to get this done right now because the deadline is tomorrow, and if I don’t, then the whole project is ruined.”

I thought about it as this is something that I’m enjoying doing and I just want to do it. And in times where I am just getting a bit pushed, that’s what I try to think about. I try to think about it as something enjoyable. I try to just take my time with it as much as I can and have fun with it.

Maurice Cherry:
What do you hope people take away from your work when they look at it?

Morgan Bissant:
I would hope that they could see the beauty in a lot of these different characters. I like to do a lot of black girls and black women, and I’m sure you’ve seen, because you have seen my portfolio, but little black kids. I like to draw a lot of that stuff. And growing up, I had issues where I want to say I had lower self-esteem than I should have had. I never really felt like I was cute. I didn’t think that I was pretty, because I would see a lot of the cartoons, like the heroes and the love interests on a lot of cartoons, and they wouldn’t look like me. And that is what made me want to put a lot of black features and characters into my artwork, because while we did see a lot of that growing up, I felt like we didn’t exactly see as much as we probably should have gotten.

Black characters were always like the sidekicks sometimes, and they didn’t always get time to shine. And that’s something that always impacted me growing up. And so I like to put that into my work. I like to show people, like anyone that we are beautiful and nothing is wrong with our features. Our features are beautiful. They make us unique, they make us who we are. And I think that that’s something that I wanted to put in my work, because I want everybody to be able to embrace that. So, I always hope that little kids and adults alike can take that away from what I do.

Maurice Cherry:
What advice would you give to someone, they’re out here listening to your story, they’re hearing about your work and everything. What advice would you give them if they want to follow in your footsteps?

Morgan Bissant:
The advice that I would give to anybody that might want to pursue a career in art or graphic design, I would say that don’t be afraid to do what you know you want to do. Have fun doing it. I would say that if this is something that you really enjoy and you really see yourself doing this in the future, and you know you really want to go into these different arenas where you can use your art for animation or books. So, I mean I would encourage anybody that wants to pursue art to just go for it. I don’t think that you should let anything scare you from doing it. If it’s something that you enjoy doing I say, why not do it?

I mean it’s something that it’s always been fun to me. I could never really see myself doing anything else. And so I felt like this is what I had to pursue, this is what I was going to do. And I know that there’s other people that feel that way and I feel that they should go forward with it, because I mean why keep yourself from doing something that you enjoy doing and that you can make a living off of it. And I know a lot of people feel that it’s harder to actually make a living off your work than doing other things, but I believe that we have so many examples out that shows that that’s actually a possibility. You can work in animation, you can do books, you can even do things like ads and partnerships with brands.

You can do flyers, you can design things for brands, branding or whatever. There’s so many options that you can explore, things that you can put your talents toward. There’s so many options that you can look into that you can use your skills to make it tangible and make it real. So, I would say that you shouldn’t limit yourself and you shouldn’t hold yourself back if you’re afraid that you might not be able to get different opportunities, or you are afraid that you might not be able to get into this certain arena so there’s nothing you can do, because there’s a lot of things that we, as artists, we don’t really think about how many opportunities that they really have out there.

But there’s a lot. It’s just the possibilities are endless. And on top of that, I would encourage people to always have fun with what they’re doing. Never be afraid to experiment and do different things. Just have fun. Just enjoy it. Take time to perfect your craft. Take time to practice. You always want to take time to pour into it, because if this is something that you’ll enjoy doing and you want to put yourself out there and you want to continue to grow, I mean you always want to keep doing it. You always want to keep those, I guess, creative gears turning.

Maurice Cherry:
Yeah. Where do you see yourself in the next five years? What work do you want to be doing?

Morgan Bissant:
I’m honestly not 100% sure. I honestly never thought I would even see myself where I’m at now five years ago. It’s different for me. If there is something in particular that I could be doing down the line, I’ve always been interested in animation of course, because it’s always been a huge inspiration for me. And I’ve always wanted to work maybe in an animated series, maybe like creating some characters or concept work or visual development or something along those lines. So, here’s hoping that maybe at some point in my career the door may open for that. I’m just here to see where life takes me as of right now.

Maurice Cherry:
Well, just to wrap things up here, where can our audience find out more information about you, about your work and everything? Where can they find that online?

Morgan Bissant:
So, I am on Instagram, Twitter, and TikTok at morg_city. Also on Facebook at Morgan Bissant, all one word. I have a website, morganbissant.com, and you can basically see most of my portfolio on there, and you can find links to my social pages at the bottom.

Maurice Cherry:
All right, sounds good. Well, Morgan Bissant, I want to thank you so much for coming on the show. Thank you really for talking about I mean, one, your journey as an artist, as an illustrator, as a designer, and how it’s brought you to where you are now. But I really think it’s good that you talked about your process, you shared your inspirations, you shared your experiences. My hope is that when people listen back through this interview, and especially once they get a chance to really look at your work, they’ll be able to get a good overall view of who you are as an artist and the work that you’re bringing into the world. So, thank you so much for coming on the show. I appreciate it.

Morgan Bissant:
Well, thank you so much for having me. This is definitely a pleasure speaking with you.

Sponsored by Brevity & Wit

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If you know how to deliver excellent creative work reliably, and enjoy the autonomy of a virtual-based, freelance life (with no non-competes), check them out at brevityandwit.com.

Akeem Roberts

It takes a lot of hard work, dedication, and sacrifice to make it on your own as an artist, and Akeem Roberts knows this well. This illustrator and animator juggles being an associate director at Holler Studios with freelancing for The New Yorker. Even though Akeem’s been in the game for nearly a decade, I have a feeling that we’ll be seeing his work for many years to come.

We talked about Akeem’s new gig at Holler, and from there he went into sharing his unique approach to storytelling. Akeem also spoke about attending the University of South Carolina, went into some of his influences for his artistic style, and gave some great advice for handling operational tasks as a freelancer. Akeem knows that success doesn’t happen overnight, and he’s put in the time and effort to come out on top!

Interview Transcript

Maurice Cherry:
All right, so tell us who you are and what you do.

Akeem Roberts:
My name is Akeem S. Roberts. I’m a cartoonist for The New Yorker. illustrator for J.D. the Kid Barber series, and a book designer by day.

Maurice Cherry:
How has 2023 been going so far?

Akeem Roberts:
2023 has been pretty crazy so far. I started off the year unemployed, just doing freelance stuff, and as of like three weeks ago, I just got a brand new job and sort of getting the reins on that and everything’s been going pretty good.

Maurice Cherry:
Oh, nice. Congratulations on the new job.

Akeem Roberts:
Thank you.

Maurice Cherry:
Do you have any plans for the summer? Anything you want to do?

Akeem Roberts:
For the summer, right now I don’t have anything planned. I’m sure I’ll just try to go to a beach or a lake or something and just relax for a little bit.

Maurice Cherry:
I’m curious, from last year to this year, aside from the employment change that you mentioned about, have there been any other kind of changes for you? Anything else going on?

Akeem Roberts:
I’d say from last year to this year, I’ve more committed to being in publishing versus animation, which was kind of the main thing that I did at the start of my career was mostly animation. After I started doing stuff at The New Yorker and stuff with Kokila, I slowly started making the transition into publishing.

Maurice Cherry:
What brought that transition on aside from just more work? Was it a feeling or anything?

Akeem Roberts:
I felt like for animation mostly it was things move a little bit slower and it feels like the artists… I guess I was a cog in the machine animation-wise, while publishing, even though I am still just in the machine, I have a little more of a voice and a little more of a say, and I guess it just feels more freeing.

Maurice Cherry:
Sounds like there’s just more, I guess, agency, I guess, in publishing.

Akeem Roberts:
Yes, exactly.

Maurice Cherry:
Okay. Let’s talk about some of your work that you’re doing as a freelance illustrator. I’m curious, what does a regular day look like for you these days?

Akeem Roberts:
If I’m doing dailies for The New Yorker, I’ll try to get up around like 7:00 and then hit Twitter or some kind of news source and just go through trending and try to see what’s going on, what happened in the past 24 hours. Then, I’m seeing if I can find a joke and connect that into a bit for The New Yorker for their daily cartoons.

Maurice Cherry:
You’re creating new pieces every day, so you have to check the news, be like, “Oh, this is funny,” draw something, and-

Akeem Roberts:
Yeah, yeah.

Maurice Cherry:
… then it’s just done? That’s it?

Akeem Roberts:
It depends on the process. Sometimes, for instance, I got one in for a daily after the trailer of the Barbie movie dropped. For that, I had an idea of doing something of scientists trying to get to the Barbie because there was all of those memes about people saying three, how many or whatever for Barbie movie tickets. I wanted to like have that idea of getting to the Barbie movie first and having it happen immediately, so I was first thinking like scientists creating a time machine to get there on the day that it’s released. Then, for The New Yorker, I thought of that idea, but I put a little bit of ’80s nostalgia in it, so then I changed it to kind of like Back to the Future where they’re trying to go to the future to see the Barbie movie.

Maurice Cherry:
Like Marty and Doc Brown and the DeLorean?

Akeem Roberts:
Yeah, yeah, so they’re all sitting in the JCPenney parking lot trying to get to the Barbie movie.

Maurice Cherry:
That’s funny. It’s interesting, though, that you have to, I guess, get them in by a certain time, but it’s every day, so that makes sense, I guess.

Akeem Roberts:
Yeah, yeah. For the dailies, it’s you have to get the sketches to them before 9:00, and then they’ll let you know if they like it or not by 10:00, and then you have that done by noon. The one that I did for the Barbie was like a bonus for the daily, so I didn’t have to get that done till 2:00.

Maurice Cherry:
Okay. No, that’s just interesting that it’s so fast. I don’t know why I thought maybe you would have done it the day before or something like that.

Akeem Roberts:
I think some people do. I’m reckless.

Maurice Cherry:
I see you do a little bit of everything, book illustrations, you do comics, you do animation, you do editorial work. Is there a particular one of these that you prefer to do?

Akeem Roberts:
I think I prefer to do comics and publishing chapter book stuff. I feel like that gives me the most control, but also the most freedom. I feel like when you’re usually doing a comic book, you got to do like 30-something pages and the deadline’s pretty tight, but when it comes to chapter books or whatever, it’s a little bit… It’s still tight, but it’s not as, I don’t know, it’s not as hard just because you’re just doing one panel kind of basically, versus doing nine panels, trying to semi-tell a story, designing multiple backgrounds. It’s a lot.

Maurice Cherry:
Hmm. I can see how doing it in that sort of controlled format also, it’s just easier on you probably just on your workload, you know?

Akeem Roberts:
Yeah, yeah.

Maurice Cherry:
Talk to me about how you approach a new project. What does your process look like?? Does it vary per type?

Akeem Roberts:
Yeah, it definitely varies per type, per project. For anything that’s like New Yorker, that’s just I’m just on the subway jotting down ideas. I send my notes app and I’ll just like think of jokes, try to connect them, and then from there I’ll draw a little small thumbnail and then sketch a bigger illustration for that and then send that to the New Yorker. Then, my process for when I’m doing my web comics also starts on my phone. I just write a joke, describe what’s happening in the panels. Then, from there I do a thumbnail and then I finalize it and then add all the texts and stuff.

Then, for animation, usually with this, there’s only a couple of those that I started from scratch where I had a original character and original plot. Those started off more… I was in Word and Google Docs instead because it was longer format and I had to share it with other people to read, look over, see if they had any notes on the script. For those, it’s like script first, and then you start the thumbnails and animating each thing.

Maurice Cherry:
What if you’re doing, say, editorial work or something for the book? Is that process kind of the same?

Akeem Roberts:
Yeah, editorial is like you’ll… Most of the stuff that I did editorial for was like for Men’s Health. They have this section called Cool Dads-

Maurice Cherry:
Mm-hmm.

Akeem Roberts:
… so for that, I would like… They would give me the article that a celeb wrote, and then I would read it. Then, from there, I would like think about an illustration that kind of hit the vibe of what the celeb wrote. The latest one I did was for like LeVar Burton. His whole thing was talking about reading books to his daughter and giving her the freedom to read and how he wants to be there for her. Then, he also makes a reference basically to Harry Potter.

For that, I just drew him in like the garbs with a wand fighting off the Dementors because in the article he talks about how his daughter stopped reading because she didn’t like the Dementors. He was like, “Maybe I should have not introduced her to Harry Potter.” I just took that vibe and added it to the illustration. I would send like three sketches and then the art director over there would pick which one they think is the best. Then, from there I would finish and color it and everything.

Maurice Cherry:
You kin of have to read a little bit of what it is that you’re going, then, to make sure that the illustration kind of matches that in some way.

Akeem Roberts:
Yeah, yeah. With every editorial or even like the children’s book, you have to read the manuscript and everything first before you can fully get the gist of it to kind of sum it up in whatever illustration, whether it’s for a chapter or for an article.

Maurice Cherry:
Yeah. Last year, I was Editor-in-Chief of a print magazine. This was part of the job that I was doing at the time, and our in-house creative director had decided for our first issue that he wanted to also do all the editorial illustrations. I was like, “Okay, that’s-

Akeem Roberts:
Uh-huh.

Maurice Cherry:
… “a lot, but if you want to do it.” He also did the cover and everything. I was like, “Look, more power to you.” It was so funny because the way he approached it was like, “Well, I have an idea of a theme for the whole magazine,” and so he just did illustrations based on whatever, and none of them matched the article in any sort of real way. I’m telling him like, “You should probably try to make sure that the images match what the article is about. You drew a polar bear. This article has nothing to do with polar bears. What’s the connection for the reader to look at this?” He’s like, “Oh, well, the connection is winter because we’re publishing the magazine in the winter.” I’m like, “Huh. No, no.” That doesn’t make any-

Akeem Roberts:
Yeah, that’s sounds like a little bit of a stretch, but you know, I feel it, I feel it, I feel it.

Maurice Cherry:
Well, that’s one of us that feels it. I mean, eventually we ended up sort of just going with the concept because we didn’t have enough time, but for the second issue, the pieces fit the article more and I told him like, “Look, read the article and then get started with designing.” He would just start designing and be like, “Oh, I have to read the article?” I’m like, “Yes, it would help. It would be helpful so at least what you’re designing matches that in some capacity.” So…

Akeem Roberts:
Yeah yeah. You got to read the article.

Maurice Cherry:
Yeah.

Akeem Roberts:
You got to.

Maurice Cherry:
I mean, how do you approach storytelling through your art? I’m pretty sure it’s more than just like in, say, the book illustration example, it’s more than just reading. How do you really approach telling a story through your art?

Akeem Roberts:
I would read it and then I would like try to imagine it in my head and say, for instance, for the J.D.the Kid Barber series that I did, for that it was reading it, and then the art director would kind of tell me what they imagined in it. They were like, “Oh, this character is in their room,” but it’s up to me to add anything else that I wanted to add into it, so I would just try and look up Google images basically to find what I imagined this school look like because references, it’s always great to have. I know sometimes it’s like, especially when you’re starting out, you want to not use any references. You’re like, “I can do this from my head.” You can’t. I mean, you can, but you’ll miss the small details that you want to have caught if you weren’t looking at a reference. I would look at reference, kind of imagine the area, and then just try to imagine the characters just living and breathing.

For some of them I would add even like small jokes. One of the illustrations, the art director was, “Oh, he’s losing this battle, but everyone has numbers up saying 10 for this guy who’s winning.” Then, for one of those, I drew his friend in there giving him a thumbs up with like a two, so everyone has a good rating except he has a bad rating for the guy, and he’s got a thumbs up giving it to the guy being like, “Don’t worry, I got your back.” I try to put in little jokes like that inside the book so kids will see it and notice it. I’m trying to always make an illustration for, I guess, like the younger me if I was reading it as a kid.

Maurice Cherry:
Hmm. Do you try to add a little something that’s just unique to you in each image that you do?

Akeem Roberts:
If I do try to add anything, I try to add humor. I feel like that’s my go-to form of communicating is trying to add a joke if I can.

Maurice Cherry:
Now, we’ve had a few New Yorker illustrators on the show before, most recently, Liz Montague. I’m curious, how did you get started with doing illustrations for The New Yorker?

Akeem Roberts:
I feel like my story is very unique. I have yet to hear anyone else who’s had this experience.

Maurice Cherry:
Okay.

Akeem Roberts:
Basically I was like tabling at this convention in New York called Mocha Fest, which is like an art festival, and I had a bunch of comics that I had done online and this little short story that I did that was in black and white. After that weekend, I got a message from Emma who’s like the Editor at New Yorker. She was, “Oh, do you want to do a daily shouts?” Basically like, “I like your work, and I was wondering if you want to try to submit some jokes or a daily shout or anything like that.”

I was like, “All right,” and then I sent my first batch, and then after that Friday after I sent it they were like, “Oh yeah, this one is in.” I sold one the very first time I tried, which was crazy good. I don’t know anyone else who’s done that. Maybe other people have, but I had sold it first immediately. Then, the next week, I also submitted some batches and I also sold another one, so I was feeling really good. I was like, “All right, I can do this,” and then after that, it was 40 weeks of like not selling anything.

Maurice Cherry:
Is that usually like the… You said that was sort of unique to you. I’m just curious, what would a cartoonist normally do if they’re trying to get into like The New Yorker? Is there a more-

Akeem Roberts:
Right.

Maurice Cherry:
… typical process?

Akeem Roberts:
Yeah, there’s like submissions that you can do on the website, and you can send them batches that way. Then, they’ll say, “You’ve made it,” and then you’ll get Emma’s email, so you can start sending batches to her directly. Sort of like a filtering process before you get her email, but I just got it immediately and then got one in immediately, which felt good. Then after that, it slowed down a bit, obviously.

Maurice Cherry:
I mean, you’re still doing it now, so, I mean, it obviously worked out in your favor.

Akeem Roberts:
Yeah, yeah.

Maurice Cherry:
Is there a particular style that you think, I guess… I guess it probably varies per publication, but for The New Yorker, and not to harp on them specifically, but is there a particular style that you think they’re looking for?

Akeem Roberts:
For The New Yorker, I think they’re looking kind of for something that is sketchy and has detail, but not too much. Nothing that will distract from the joke.

Maurice Cherry:
Mm-hmm.

Akeem Roberts:
Basically just like if you had to jot down a joke with stick figures in five minutes, that’s kind of the ideal I think like they want in terms of detail is just not enough stuff that will distract from it. Then, they definitely don’t want it too cartoony, which is like I always put my stuff, and maybe sometimes it’s too cartoony, but there’s a line where you’re trying to hit where it’s not cartoony in the sense that it feels like on a Saturday morning cartoon, but also not cartoony in the way that it feels like it’s Family Guy. You got to hit a perfect, unique just like sketch style that takes a lot of work, but looks simple.

Maurice Cherry:
Mm-hmm. I get what you’re saying. I get what you’re saying. Certainly, nothing that’s like, I don’t know, Marvel style, like not a comic kind of thing, but you also-

Akeem Roberts:
Yeah, yeah.

Maurice Cherry:
… want it to have some level of expression and polish, as you would say, that doesn’t detract from the joke.

Akeem Roberts:
Yeah.

Maurice Cherry:
Now, you’ve worked with some other big clients as well, Boom! Studios. You mentioned Men’s Health earlier, Conde Nast, which is over a bunch of different magazines and such. Is it easier working with bigger clients like those than, say, smaller clients?

Akeem Roberts:
For sure. I feel like bigger clients, they kind of have an idea and they kind of let you be free, especially if they know your work. They’ll be like, “All right, I saw your work. I kind of imagine what you can do. If you’ll do that, we’ll be great.” I feel like when it comes to mom and pop type of clients, it’s a little less freeing for the artists in a sense because I guess the dollar value that they’re spending is… it’s precious, their $500 or whatever.

This thing that you’re doing for them, especially if it’s like a logo or anything that they’re going to use over again for t-shirts, it’s very important. Because of that and because of how important it is to them, they’re sometimes a little overbearing. They’ll overwork in illustration because of having multiple revisions that kind of the artist loses… The more revisions that’s happening, the artist kind of loses the spirit sometimes. If it’s 20 revisions to get this logo done, the artist each time is less and less into it-

Maurice Cherry:
Yeah.

Akeem Roberts:
… and that doesn’t mean that there will be a point where they don’t care. The artist is always going to care because it’s for their portfolio and their job. They want it to be good. It’s kind of like a way of the artist helping… not helping themselves, but guarding themselves from being like… If you’re too personally attached, you’ll get upset about the notes-

Maurice Cherry:
Right.

Akeem Roberts:
… so you have to be removed. The more and more you get notes, the more and more you’re like, “All right, this is getting away from my vision and I’m trying to see if I can get exactly what they’re seeing in their head,” which is not normally something an artist can reproduce is what another person is envisioning.

Maurice Cherry:
I feel like if I had to do 20 revisions on a design, I would want to fire the client. To me, that feels like the client really doesn’t know what they want, and they feel like you’re just going to keep iterating on it until it magically appears to them. I mean, I know that’s how we’re sort of just pulling that number out of anywhere, but I get what you’re saying about the dollar value, which I think is something that’s really important. A lot of these bigger companies just have the budget to be able to do bigger type projects, more audacious ideas, et cetera, but then smaller clients, that money has to really go far. That’s not to say that larger clients aren’t as invested in the end project, but it just takes on… There’s an added gravity to it when it’s from a smaller client or for a smaller client, I should say.

Akeem Roberts:
Yeah, yeah.

Maurice Cherry:
Yeah. Can you discuss any upcoming projects or collabs that you’re excited about?

Akeem Roberts:
Right now, I don’t really have anything coming up. I guess the only thing I have is I’m working on a graphic novel and I’m trying to pitch to HarperCollins or Kokila to just get the story that I have in my head off the ground.

Maurice Cherry:
Okay. I’ve always wanted to do a graphic novel. I cannot draw, but I have had ideas for characters in my head since I was a teenager to put into a graphic novel. I’ve talked about it here on the show before. People probably already know this, but one day I’m going to have the time and the funds to make it happen, so I hope it works out for you.

Akeem Roberts:
Yeah, yeah. I’m hoping it works out, too.

Maurice Cherry:
Now, I want to get more into your work and your career, but let’s learn more about Akeem. Let’s learn more about you. Are you originally from New York?

Akeem Roberts:
No, I am kind of like from everywhere is what I tell everyone. I was born in North Dakota and my Mom was in the military, so I moved around a lot from North Dakota to Alabama, to Germany, to South Carolina, to Texas, to Maryland, to New York. A lot of places, but most of my time was in the South, so I guess I could just say I’m from the South.

Maurice Cherry:
Wow. Did you do a lot of drawing growing up?

Akeem Roberts:
Yes. I would just say that I started drawing… There’s two big reasons I started drawing, so first I was just doodling, and then in third grade, I won an award for the state in South Carolina, third place for this painting I did-

Maurice Cherry:
Hmm.

Akeem Roberts:
… and that was a good boost. I was like, “Oh, wow, this is cool. I can draw.” I didn’t really think of anything of it. I was just like, “All right, I can doodle.” Then, in fifth grade, there was this girl that could draw way better than me. I was crushing, so then I would try to get better to impress her, and I think that’s kind of my origin story is trying to get better to impress a girl. Then, I just kept drawing on my own.

Maurice Cherry:
Did it work?

Akeem Roberts:
It did not work, you know? So-

Maurice Cherry:
Oh.

Akeem Roberts:
… ultimately it was for me, you know?

Maurice Cherry:
I had someone on the show a couple episodes ago, Kendell Burton, and he was telling me how he first… He’s an art director now, but he was like, “Oh yeah, I first got into design in the web because I was making a blog on Zynga to try to meet girls.” I’m like, “Does that work?”

Akeem Roberts:
Never does.

Maurice Cherry:
You were doing a lot of drawing and stuff growing up, and I see you went to the University of South Carolina and majored in Media Arts. Tell me about that time. What was that like?

Akeem Roberts:
Media Arts, basically, I ended up there because I was very late at applying for colleges, and my family had just moved back to South Carolina, so then I just applied there. This guy that I met with was like, “Oh, tell me what you want to do.: I was telling him that I probably would want to do some animation, like comics and stuff, and so he was… The Media Arts Program, which is basically teaching you how to use the Adobe Suite while learning about film, photography, script writing, and so it was like mostly on the film and photography side. Then, I minored in Illustration, so I did like one figure drawing class on my senior year and one illustration class on my senior year.

Maurice Cherry:
Do you feel like they really kind of prepared you as an artist?

Akeem Roberts:
I feel like not in a sense of what I ideally wanted to do, which was basically do animation and stuff like that. I didn’t have a student film. I didn’t even take the animation course because I never signed up in time, but I guess overall, it kind of helped me be a jack-of-all-trade because certain things with film and photography and script writing can transfer into illustration. Having that does help me visualize ideas, but not necessarily in the sense of, “Okay, you do this something. You’ll have a job immediately after.” You know?

Maurice Cherry:
Yeah, I think school is interesting in that way. I mean, I majored in Math, so I didn’t think-

Akeem Roberts:
Oh no.

Maurice Cherry:
… when I was graduating I was going to have… Actually, no. I mean, I did major in Math, that’s true, but I had like a scholarship thing lined up with the program that I was in that I was going to work for the government after I graduated. Then, that fell through like junior year because of 9/11. It fell through. I was like, “Oh, I have no plans for what I’m going to do when I graduate.” I was working part time at the Symphony here in Atlanta selling tickets, and I did that, I think… I did that up till I graduated, and I remember when I graduated they took the calculator away from my kiosk because they were like, “Well, you have a math degree now. You don’t need this.” I’m like, “Is that supposed to be funny?”

I mean, I didn’t need it, but I didn’t have any sort of career plans lined up after graduation because I thought I was set. I really didn’t even pursue other companies. I snuck my resume into other departments’ resume books so I could get interviews at places. I was wholly unprepared going into senior year for any kind of actual career goals. I was in college just because I was a nerd that liked math.

Akeem Roberts:
Yeah. That actually sounds very familiar to my story. That’s basically kind of like how I ended up in New York was my friend got me an internship in New York, and then I did that internship for the summer, but it kind of fell through near the end. Then, I was working at Starbucks in South Carolina. I was making $9 an hour, but the rent was just so much. Most of my money was going towards the rent-

Maurice Cherry:
Yeah.

Akeem Roberts:
… and then it was like… I think the rent was… I want to say almost like 600, almost 800, which is a lot. Then, they were like, “Oh, you could transfer to the Starbucks in New York,” which I transferred and I was making like 13. Then, the apartment I had up here was 584 with everything included, so I was way better off staying in New York, and that’s just like how I got here was not planning on staying. I came up for an internship and I was like, “All right, I’m just going to go back,” but then it just seemed to work out better for me to just live here than be in South Carolina barely making it-

Maurice Cherry:
I mean-

Akeem Roberts:
… you know?

Maurice Cherry:
… that makes sense, and I would say also probably as an artist, I mean, you kind of want to be in the cultural capital of the country when it comes to experiences and stuff. I would imagine you probably wouldn’t have access to the same level of experiences in South Carolina that you would in New York City, you know?

Akeem Roberts:
I mean, I feel like… Okay, so when I was going to college, there was this rumor that actually a bunch of comic artists actually lives in South Carolina, which might be true, but I just never met anyone.

Maurice Cherry:
If I recall, and this was years ago when I interviewed him, Sanford Greene, who’s like, I know he’s done stuff for Marvel, for DC, pretty prolific visual artist, lives in South Carolina. He lives in South Carolina.

Akeem Roberts:
Oh really?

Maurice Cherry:
Yeah, he went to Benedict’s.

Akeem Roberts:
Yeah.

Maurice Cherry:
Yep.

Akeem Roberts:
Yeah, so like yeah, I guess… Look, I guess South Carolina is the home for the comic artist, but I just could not find that community at all, but comic artists tend to be homebodies, so you would never really see them.

Maurice Cherry:
Yeah. I mean, I’d imagine, yeah, it’s probably not… There’s no collective or something like that. I would say it’s probably just easier in New York because of availability and just the cultural atmosphere of the city. I came from a small town in Alabama, and if I would’ve stayed there after I graduated high school, I’d know I wouldn’t be doing what I’m doing now because there was no kind of technology or design or anything. You either got married, got into the church, or maybe worked a factory job. Not a lot of options.

Akeem Roberts:
Yeah, yeah.

Maurice Cherry:
Yeah. I mean, that’s not endemic of the South, but just in particular, like-

Akeem Roberts:
Yeah [inaudible 00:30:14].

Maurice Cherry:
… your environment can help out, you know?

Akeem Roberts:
No, no, I hear you. I have a bunch of family from Alabama.

Maurice Cherry:
Yeah. One of your early career gigs, you were at this place called ideaMACHINE Studio where you worked as an animator. Talk to me about that.

Akeem Roberts:
All right, so crazy with that was one of my friends came up and he was doing photography. I was still working at Starbucks at this time, and he was like, “Oh, there’s an animation studio just like here. Do you want to apply?” I was like, “All right, cool.” We possibly could work in the same building, whatever, so I applied. Then, I got the job, and then that same day my friend got fired from whatever company he was working at in the building, so it’s like we didn’t get to work together, but he did help me get this job by seeing it. Then, at that same time, I was still working at Starbucks, which I worked that job while also doing Starbucks for like a year and a half just doing both of them.

Maurice Cherry:
Wow.

Akeem Roberts:
Yeah, and at Starbucks, I had just became a shift manager. I would only work two or three days a week, but it was weird because I’d be in charge then, so it’s like…

Maurice Cherry:
You were able to kind of juggle it sounds like.

Akeem Roberts:
Yeah, yeah. I was able to juggle it, but it was surreal once I think about it, just like how many hours I was working. It was a lot.

Maurice Cherry:
How was ideaMACHINE Studio? Was that kind of your first studio experience?

Akeem Roberts:
Yeah, that was my first studio experience. That one, it was a little more… I guess in a sense it kind of trained me, kind of gave me the animation class kind of a sense because I went in there knowing some stuff, but not really knowing the 12 principles of animation or anything like that, just what I saw online. Most of the stuff that I did for them was kind of like whiteboard explainer videos.

Maurice Cherry:
Okay.

Akeem Roberts:
It was like for pharmaceutical companies that had this idea, but wanted it to be explained in a simply way. That’s what we did for them. There was tiny stuff that you can animate, and then I would push it every once in a while to try and get better at my animation chops and my graphic design skills. I guess in a sense that job kind of trained me, but it was very reluctantly because the guy who runs the company was… I was trying to get better at art, and he was like, “You don’t need to get better at drawing.” I was like, “Yes, I do.” Then, I just kept pushing and doing my web comic on the side was also something I did. Just work on my skills and progress my abilities to draw and stuff like that. Was just doing that weekly in order to force myself to put something out consistently and have a foundation.

Maurice Cherry:
Yeah, so you were doing this kind of freelance work or doing your own work at least as well as doing this nine-to-five. How did you balance that?

Akeem Roberts:
I did not sleep a lot is how I balanced that. Basically, I would work during the day. If I had a Starbucks shift, maybe it was two or three hours, so I’d work nine to five, and then I would walk over to the Starbucks. I just happened to be super close to this company and then work four hours there and then come back home, which the commute was good. It was like 30 minutes, not that bad, especially for New York, and then work on my freelance stuff. Then that started again in the morning. It was a lot.

Maurice Cherry:
It’s amazing the stuff that we pull off when we’re younger just to try to get that… I don’t know, I guess you just have all that youthful energy. You can get it done. Nowadays, absolutely not. I’m in bed-

Akeem Roberts:
I-

Maurice Cherry:
… at a certain hour. I not staying up pulling all-nighters anymore. No, I get what you’re saying. It takes a lot to try to make sure you’re doing all of these things because, of course, you’re doing what you have to do to pay your bills and whatever, but you’re also establishing yourself during this time doing your own thing, which I think is super important. It’s something I tell a lot of designers that come on the show, especially ones that just start off, like have something on the side that’s just your own thing, you know?

Akeem Roberts:
Yeah.

Maurice Cherry:
You can still do what you have to do to get involved with your career at your workplace, but have something that’s just yours.

Akeem Roberts:
Yeah.

Maurice Cherry:
Yeah. Now, after you worked at ideaMACHINE, you ended up at another studio called Holler where you were their Associate Animation Director. Was that a big shift from your work at ideaMACHINE?

Akeem Roberts:
Yeah, that was a big shift. One of the main things that like… The reason I left ideaMACHINE was first I wanted to grow as an artist, and then the second thing was that they were in Brooklyn, and then they were moving the company to New Jersey. I was… I don’t want to step foot in New Jersey, no offense to New Jersey, but I was just like, “I live in Brooklyn. The commute is crazy. Getting on the path just to get there, I absolutely can’t do it.” This is around the same time that The New Yorker reached out to me, and then this company reached out to me and they were like, “Hey, do you want to do a test for us?” I did a test for them. I had my Cintiq and everything all set up, and then my Cintiq broke that weekend-

Maurice Cherry:
Oh.

Akeem Roberts:
… and I had to use the Bamboo, which is kind of like is still a drawing tablet, but just doesn’t have a screen. I had to use my Bamboo tablet and finish that animation for them, which is a quick reaction GIF that was like three seconds long. I did that over the weekend and they liked it.

Then, I started working there and the culture was very different. ideaMACHINE’s culture was kind of like you were doing like a student project. You would have art director… They would like help you, but not with any direction. The art direction was purely up to the animator. The way that it looked was purely up to the animator. The client would give notes, but it wasn’t like I had to follow a guide. I was the guide. It was like everything I did at ideaMACHINE from like the music to audio, sound effects and all of that compositing, there we did… It was a one-shop stop for one artist on each video. It wasn’t like working as a team really. It was kind of one guy is doing this, and if they need help with the animation, they’ll ask you, but it wasn’t anything that was ever felt like a cohesive team effort where everyone is trying to draw in the same style or anything like that.

Maurice Cherry:
Hmm, so it seems like it was definitely just a ramp-up in terms of responsibility, though, right?

Akeem Roberts:
Yeah, yeah, so for Holler, when I first started, I was just doing little three-second GIFs and there’ll be client stuff, and then we’ll work on those. Then, later on, I started directing some shorts that they did right before I left. There was one called Akemi-chan: Is It Magical?, which is an idea that I had which was like a play on Magical School Girls trying to do a bunch of anime inside jokes kind of stuff like that. I was writing the script for that and then guiding the people that was working with me of how I wanted it to look and fleshing out storyboards and having more of a commanding role, which felt good, which kind of led to my newest role is sort of still doing that. It was kind of a stepping stone of becoming in charge, taking a step back and letting people do their things, but also helping them grow.

Maurice Cherry:
Hmm. I would imagine even with that, it’s sort of helping you out in your freelance because you were still freelancing also during this time with Holler?

Akeem Roberts:
Yeah, yeah, yeah. With Holler, I was still freelancing. Like the beginning of 2020, like in January 2020, I got a call from Kokila being like, “Hey, do you want to work on this book?” I was like, “This name looks familiar.” I was looking at the art director’s name, and then I looked it up and it was the same art director for Hair Love, which I loved Hair Love. It was great. They’d just had that short come out. It was beautiful with Matthew A. Cherry. I was, “Wow, I would love to work with them.” I reached out to them and I was getting started. I was like, “Man, I don’t know how I’m going to do this with the commute, but I’m going to try and make it happen.” Then, of course, the pandemic happened, so it made it a little easier for me to finish my day job and then jump straight to my freelance. From there, every day I was doing illustrations from like 9:30 at night to like 2:00 in the morning-

Maurice Cherry:
Wow.

Akeem Roberts:
… just to get those things done, and it was a lot.

Maurice Cherry:
Yeah, but I mean, I would imagine it changed the way you work freelance, right?

Akeem Roberts:
Yeah, yeah, definitely. Freelance before I felt was more if I felt like I had the energy to do it, I’d do it-

Maurice Cherry:
Mm-hmm.

Akeem Roberts:
… but with the book, it was like, “All right, you got to get these pages done. You got to get these multiple books done. You kind of have to treat this now like a full-time job where you clock in.” I was like, “All right, my clock-in time is 9:30 at night to 2:00 in the morning.”

Maurice Cherry:
Yeah, yeah, that’s good. You get into doing it, you kind of time box your schedule, it sort of helps out, especially if you’re doing it on a regular basis.

Akeem Roberts:
Yeah.

Maurice Cherry:
Now, something that I’ve seen at least over the past decade that I’ve done this show, but I’d say probably prior to that as well, you started to see a really big increase of Black artistic talent, visual artistic talent specifically. Cartoons, animations, fine art, like you mentioned Hair Love from Matthew A. Cherry. No relation, I think, I think. Any genealogists out there want to dive into that, I’m more than welcome.

When I see all of this, I also end up seeing this question about representation, like that always seems to come up, which I think is kind unfair that if you are a Black artist that you have to represent your community through your work. I think it’s up to the individual artist what they choose to do. Is that something that you feel like you have to do through your work? Have you gotten that kind of, I don’t know, sense of… I don’t even want to say responsibility, but have you gotten that, say, from other people, from clients, et cetera?

Akeem Roberts:
Yeah, I would say there’s a little bit of that, and there’s like, for instance, when I first started at Holler, I was one of the only two black people there that was the artist and black people in general. One of the things I did when I started there was like I didn’t want to get pigeonholed as the guy who you only come to for Black stuff, right?

Maurice Cherry:
Yeah.

Akeem Roberts:
That I immediately just did not draw. I drew like animal characters that I knew were Black or like Mother Earth was a character that had an Afro, but I knew she was Black, but it was like I didn’t do anything that was explicitly Black because I didn’t want to get pigeonholed. With my comic stuff, it’s slice of life, but there are times that I do stuff that is political, but those are very few and far between. Then, my main stance on that is just I want my web comic to… There’s a bunch of web comics out there where it’s just nothing really happens. It’s just like couples chilling and that’s it.

I was like, “This web comic, I’m doing it to show that Black people are normal. This is my every day. This is slice of life. There’s like nothing big going on. No overarching villain. This is just a Black guy chilling. Here’s a look into this. It’s not what you normally expect.” I feel like there’s that, and then sometimes if there’s bigger issues, I’ll just bleed over. Then, I’m just like, “I have to address this.” I will-

Maurice Cherry:
Mm-hmm.

Akeem Roberts:
… but most of it I’m just the way that I’m thinking of representation is just like, “Hey, I’m just a normal guy on the internet. This is what a normal Black dude is doing-

Maurice Cherry:
Yeah.

Akeem Roberts:
… you know? Chilling.

Maurice Cherry:
Yeah. I like that, and I’m glad you sort of framed it in that way. You know, it’s interesting, even after doing this show for as long as I’ve done it, people will only think Black designers come in one specific type. I mean, that can be whatever that type is what that type is, but I say that to say that there’s a lot of variety in what people might think might just be a monolithic set. One thing I’ve tried to do with the show is like, yeah, I have designers, but I’ve got cartoons and illustrators. I’ve had footwear designers on the show. I’ve had software developers on the show. I try to make it pretty diverse in general just to give a sense of what we’re doing out here in terms of creativity in this kind of digital age. I’m glad that you framed it in that way. I think that’s a really good way to look at it.

Akeem Roberts:
Yeah, that was also one of the things when I did the J.D. the Kid Barber books was the reason I worked so many hours on it was because I really wanted the illustrations to have like an angelic feel or like magical feeling, and to have there be depth in the Black character’s skin, so it wasn’t just a gray tone because it was on black and white, but it wasn’t just a gray tone for the skin and no light. I made sure that there was an airbrush. I showed the details of Black skin so when a Black kid opens it up, they’re like, “Oh, my skin is beautiful.” I made sure the skin popped, and that’s what I was like… That was another way of what I was thinking of representation, but not in the sense of, “Oh, this stands for something,” but just in a subtle way of like a kid opening a book and seeing that Black is beautiful.

Maurice Cherry:
Yeah. Who are some artists or illustrators that have influenced your work?

Akeem Roberts:
I got the classic Calvin and Hobbes. Loved the Garfield. Loved Boondocks. Maybe it wasn’t age-appropriate for me to be watching it when I was, but I did love The Boondocks. Strong anime influence. Just a bunch of stuff. Even speaking of The Boondocks, when I was in college, I think this guy is named Carl Jones. He worked on The Boondocks.

Maurice Cherry:
Yeah, yeah.

Akeem Roberts:
Yeah. He was in Columbia, South Carolina, for something. I don’t know what he was there for, and he saw my sketchbook. He was like, “Oh, let me look at this.” Then, he looked at it and he was like, “You got some good ideas here, but you really need to work on your fundamentals.” From there, I just started working on my fundamentals like crazy, which I reached out to him and I told him that and he was like, “Wow.” Then, that was it, That was the last we talked, but he was like, “Wow, thanks.” Then, he started following me on Instagram and I as like, “All right, cool.”

Maurice Cherry:
No, that’s so interesting. Early… I wouldn’t even say… This wasn’t even in my career, and I keep sort of making these parallels because you’re saying some things that line up directly with some experiences that I’ve had. This was the year, God, I sound so old. This was like 2000 I want to say, ’99, 2000 maybe, but I was palling around on the internet. This was back when Yahoo used to be a big destination on the web for a lot of people.

Akeem Roberts:
Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Maurice Cherry:
It had chat, it had games. I mean, ask any elder Millennial about Yahoo Spades, and they will spin you a tale, okay. Yahoo had a lot of these user groups that you could just join or whatever. Very similar to like, I guess, a forum or something like that. They had one around Black comic books that was just called like Black Comics. When I tell you the crรจme de la crรจme of Black artists at the time were in there, I’m talking Denys Cowan, I’m talking Dwayne McDuffie. Dwayne McDuffie-

Akeem Roberts:
Oh wow.

Maurice Cherry:
… actually gave me a critique on a comic book idea that I had. I was like, “Yeah, I want to make this comic book about these like… They’re ninjas, but they’re Black, and I’m going to call it Black Ninjas.” I mean, I can laugh about it now. This is terrible. He’s like, “This is just-

Akeem Roberts:
Oh no.

Maurice Cherry:
… “you’ve just taken Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles,” which I love, “you’ve just taken Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and mapped their direct characteristics onto Black people.” He’s like, “If you want to make something that’s your own, you really have to make it your own. You can’t just copy from what someone else has done.”

That has stuck with me. I mean, I’ve certainly taken that advice with other projects and things that I’ve done, but this was way back in the day. It’s amazing how even just like those kind of little comments that you get from someone that has been where you’re trying to go can help just set you in the right direction, that kind of indirect mentorship in a way.

Akeem Roberts:
Yeah.

Maurice Cherry:
What advice would you give to any aspiring artists out there that are just starting out in the industry? What would you tell them?

Akeem Roberts:
Work on your fundamentals, but also when you’re doing contracts, there’s a couple of things you need to make sure you have, which is a kill fee. If you finish an illustration, no matter how much percentage of it, they’ll still pay you what they said they’ll pay you. That way, even if they’re like, “Oh, you finished this illustration,” and then they’re like, “Actually, we don’t want to do the project anymore,” if you have a kill fee, that would be like, “Hey, I finished a hundred percent of this project. Pay me a hundred percent of the project.” No matter what, they still have to pay, which is important.

Then, make sure you have a limited number of revisions. I like to do three revisions, and then if a client goes over that, they pay for that, so like you get these three revisions, then anything else they pay for it. That allows the client to think about it because I feel like if it’s unlimited revisions, the client is just going to keep being like, “Oh, what if this was pink? What if this was blue? What is this was orange?” If you’re just like, “Hey, you have three revisions,” that kind of nit-picky stuff with the client they’re not going to do because they’re like, “Okay, these are important. Let me actually think about it.” Like, “Oh, can I just imagine that color in blue or whatever versus asking the illustrator or artist to do it for them.”

Maurice Cherry:
Mm-hmm.

Akeem Roberts:
Then, after that, I would say also save 30% of whatever you get for freelance for taxes because you do not want to get caught with your pants down.

Maurice Cherry:
Are you speaking from personal experience there?

Akeem Roberts:
No, I was able to catch it. I didn’t let that happen to me, but I’m always worried. I’m always trying to save just in case. I don’t want to end up having to pay too much in taxes and don’t have any money in my account.

Maurice Cherry:
That’s a good idea. That’s a good idea. How do you stay inspired and motivated in what you do? I’m curious. How do you handle burnout or any sort of periods of low motivation? How do you get through that?

Akeem Roberts:
That, I feel like whenever I’m in a funk, especially when I’m drawing stuff, I kind of just doodle a comfort character, which for me is like I love Sonic the Hedgehog. Sonic 1 was like one of the first games I ever played. I always draw Sonic, and it helps me get out of the funk because I feel like the funk you’re usually in is just because you’re progressing in your mind, but you haven’t kind of caught up to your hand yet. You’re like, “Oh, this is looking bad,” because I know my taste is a lot better in my head and I can visualize it, but I’m like my mind, my body hasn’t quite gotten there yet. I feel like if you have a comfort character that kind of helps you put things in perspective, I guess.

For me, it’s Sonic, which whenever I’m feeling out of it, I’ll just doodle a little Sonic and I’ll be like, “Hey, this was better than what I did before. That keeps me motivated, and I always try to measure myself only to myself. Yeah, there’s going to be artists and stuff that you look up to, but make sure you just look at how you are progressing so that way you don’t lose motivation and drawing. If you’re drawing and then you see another person who just draws something straight out of the air and it’s perfect and beautiful and you’re like, “Man, I can’t do that,” you just got to like slowly keep working. Just look at yourself and be like, “Hey, I’m slightly better than what I was the other day,” and just keep going.

Maurice Cherry:
Where do you see yourself in the next five years? What kind of work do you want to be doing?

Akeem Roberts:
I’d love to have this graphic novel come out and then continue doing stuff in publishing, because right now my job is designing book covers-

Maurice Cherry:
Mm-hmm.

Akeem Roberts:
… so I don’t do the illustration or anything in that. I just do the layout, the fonts and everything-

Maurice Cherry:
Yeah.

Akeem Roberts:
… and I feel like that has been a little freeing in order to look at the process, but also pick other artists that will be good for a work or a job or something like that. I guess I give them the opportunity to show themselves.

Maurice Cherry:
I mean, I think designing book cover certainly is a…that seems pretty cool. I’ve seen awards go to just book covers in terms of design and everything, so that’s a pretty cool gig to have.

Akeem Roberts:
Yeah, yeah. I’m liking it so far. Only three weeks in, though, but it’s good right now.

Maurice Cherry:
Nice. Well, just to kind of wrap things up here, where can our audience find out more information about you, about your work and everything? Where can they find that online?

Akeem Roberts:
You can find out more about at akeemteam.com and everything pretty much at Akeem Team, which ironically, that is just like an AIM username I made back up in middle school and I just kept it,

Maurice Cherry:
Now, it’s yours. It’s yours forever.

Akeem Roberts:
Yeah.

Maurice Cherry:
All right, sounds good, man. Akeem Roberts, I want to thank you so, so much for coming on the show. Thank you for, I think, demystifying a little bit about what it’s like to be a working freelance artist. I think what’s probably the most important thing that I gathered just from this conversation and from your story is that this wasn’t an overnight success. You always sort of had this gift for drawing, and then you cultivated that through college and then through your additional work experiences. Then, you were also freelancing and now you’re doing cartoons in The New Yorker and you’re designing book covers and stuff like that.

It’s all a process, like you’ve managed to continue to build your skills up at every step of the way, and I think that’s something that for most people, particularly for most people I think that are listening, it’s just an important thing to know that success doesn’t come overnight. You’ve really kind of worked hard to make a name for yourself. I’m excited to see what else comes out from you in the future, so thank you so much for coming on the show. I appreciate it.

Akeem Roberts:
Hey, thank you so much for having me, man.

Sponsored by Brevity & Wit

Brevity & Wit

Brevity & Wit is a strategy and design firm committed to designing a more inclusive and equitable world. They are always looking to expand their roster of freelance design consultants in the U.S., particularly brand strategists, copywriters, graphic designers and Web developers.

If you know how to deliver excellent creative work reliably, and enjoy the autonomy of a virtual-based, freelance life (with no non-competes), check them out at brevityandwit.com.

Victor Ware

What does it take to be an art director? For Victor Ware, it’s a combination of three things: talent, hard work, and maybe…never sleeping. Victor has over a decade of experience and has done everything from working on legacy media brands to doing full-scale brand overhauls.

Our conversation began with a look at Victor’s current gig at Wide Eye, and he talked a bit about how future tech like AI and machine learning play into the work he does. He also talked about growing up in the DMV area, cutting his teeth in the design world at AOL and Vox Media, and balancing 9-to-5 work with starting his own design studio. Victor’s drive for excellence is evident, and I think we’ll be seeing a lot more from him in the years to come!

Interview Transcript

Maurice Cherry:
All right, so tell us who you are and what you do.

Victor Ware:
All right. My name is Victor Ware. I’m an art director at Wide Eye Creative currently. And yeah, I was specializing branding. I’ve been doing that for about six years now, specialing in branding. And yeah, that’s what I’ve been doing, what I’ve been focusing on.

Maurice Cherry:
How has the year been going for you so far? How’s 2023 been treating you?

Victor Ware:
2023 has actually been really good to me. I just transferred to Wide Eye coming from another job, so this has been my first time being a full-fledged art director. And it’s been really successful. I feel like at home at this agency. Yeah, it’s been going so far really good, and we’ve created a lot of projects in the advertise… Not the advertising space, in the political space. We have some other creative agencies that we’re working for. It’s just been really, really good.

Maurice Cherry:
Yeah, I saw that Wide Eye, I think this might have been maybe a year or two ago, was recognized by Fast Company as one of the best agencies in the country.

Victor Ware:
Yes, yes. And I can say that is not an exaggeration. The people there are super talented, they are very driven and just kind. I think wherever you work, that’s one of the biggest things you look for. At least me, I look. I look for actual people caring about people. The work is super important, the work is always going to have that importance, but I think how you treat people is far above, beyond more important than that.

Maurice Cherry:
Yeah. Now, aside from the change over to Wide Eye, have there been any other things that you’ve noticed this year that’s different from last year? Have there been any changes for you?

Victor Ware:
Oh yeah, actually, personally, I moved to Baltimore a couple years ago from DC and bought a house. And I’m living with my partner, and we’re really coming into our own and trying to build a life. I don’t know, it’s this leveling up my career, my personal life, and it’s been good so far.

Maurice Cherry:
Nice. Congratulations to you.

Victor Ware:
Thank you.

Maurice Cherry:
Let’s talk more about Wide Eye. I’m curious, what is a typical day like for you there?

Victor Ware:
Yeah, I think a typical day, I’m managing others designer, so I’m checking in with them, I’m checking on projects. Usually I’m on two to three projects, branding projects, either making sure we’re getting deliverables out the door for our clients. We also have retainers for clients, and then checking in on those projects. There’s always that balance between things that are due right now, things that will be due later in the week, and then things that are due in a month. Always checking and making sure I’m on top of things.

And then, yeah, I have time to design, so that’s either building a new logo or brand guidelines. A big part of my job is maintaining brand guidelines and creating those so that when we hand those over to clients, they have the best shot of executing their brand that we put all this energy into and they put all this energy into to make sure it will be useful and work for many years to come.

And then the other thing as meetings. I feel like a lot of designers hate meetings, but we really try to make sure our meetings are purposeful, that we have an agenda, that we know why we’re having a meeting. And that usually helps a lot. Yeah, that’s my typical day.

Maurice Cherry:
That’s good that you get to have some hands on time with the work.

Victor Ware:
Yes. I love being a designer. Like I mentioned before, this is my first time being a full-fledged art director and having more of that strategic or managerial role. I don’t want to lose my skills as a designer either, so I’m building both of those skills at the same time. But yeah, I love creating. This is why I got into this originally.

Maurice Cherry:
I’ve had other art directors and other folks working at agencies on the show, and it’s hard for them to get that time to be able to do that because, yeah, you are managing projects, you’re doing a lot of checking in, like you mentioned, you’re doing meetings, but it sounds like things are structured at Wide Eye where you still get that opportunity to get hands on with the work. You mentioned that you’re managing another designer. What does the team look like that you generally work with?

Victor Ware:
We have a pretty small team. We break it down to we have interactive side, we have our branding side, and we have a couple of designers specializing in motion design as well. We’re really a small and nimble team with designers. We have engineers, project managers, and then also operations folks that help keep the business running.

I would say there’s about 30 to 40 people working total at Wide Eye right now. And yeah, it’s like a perfectly oil machine. Everyone that comes on board just fits. I think they’ve done a really good job of creating a team that is optimized to really do the best results. And then, like I mentioned before, people that are just good people, I think that makes it even more special.

Maurice Cherry:
Now, I’m curious, with Wide Eye having the reputation that it has, even some of its clients like the White House, Democratic National Convention, et cetera… And I know that Wide Eye is not specifically just about progressive politics in that sense. A couple of episodes ago, I had on Rudy Manning. He’s an agency owner. He owns Pastilla Inc. out in Pasadena. And we were talking about the future of agencies. What does it mean to be an agency in the world that we’re currently in? Particularly when you think about the rise of AI technologies and stuff like that. I’m curious, is that something that you are dealing with now in your work? Are you having those conversations?

Victor Ware:
Yeah, it’s something that has come up a lot. One of our creator directors is very interested in technology and how… I would say we all are to some extent, how that changes design, how it could benefit design, and what that means for the landscape and for our careers. We’ve started experimenting with adding either ChatGPT into writing copy or using it for brainstorming.

I think the way I look at technology is throughout design history, it’s always changed how we work. If you go back from type setting and using the printing press and letter press all the way to now everything’s digital, I think we just learn and grow with the technology and use it to our advantage. And so that’s what I’m hoping happens. I know there’s a lot of fear that this will devalue design or it will make designers obsolete, but I think the opposite. I think designers, we’re always at the forefront of technology, we’re always trying to use that to communicate better. And so I’m hoping and I’m hopeful that the rise of AI technology will just help us communicate better if we use it right. And that’s the key. Are we using it correctly? And so that’s probably the biggest question.

Maurice Cherry:
What would you say is the correct way to use it?

Victor Ware:
As a tool and not as a replacement. I think we should never forget that all of us are people. At the end of the day, we’re talking to people, we’re designing for, people are using our products, and they’re interacting with our websites or our brands or whatever. We shouldn’t forget that. We shouldn’t just think of people as commodities or as tools of themselves. No, we’re building these for other people like ourselves, we should use our tools, whether it’s AI or just regular dumb tools to help and make the world better. And yeah, it is a challenge because there are always those people who aren’t focused on doing the best, so I think it’s up to us who are interested in doing good to push that agenda even more.

Maurice Cherry:
It’s interesting, I’m writing a book right now, I’ve mentioned this on the show before, and I’ve been using ChatGPT, not to, well, to help me write the book. I use it as a good assistant. If I need to find a lead or something that I need to pursue in terms of research, it’s been really great for that, especially for specific figures I may not know or people I may not be super familiar with. There’s only so far, I think, that you can go with just strict internet research. And what ChatGPT helps me to do is at least send me partially down the right path. Now, I will admit it’s not-

Victor Ware:
It’s not perfect.

Maurice Cherry:
It’s not perfect. And in some cases, it’s not even correct. It’s-

Victor Ware:
That’s true. It’s funny, I’ve seen a lot of examples where it’s just got things totally wrong or just makes up stuff. And so I think that is also the thing that we have to be wary of. It’s like, we can’t give too much control over it, we have to make sure we’re still living in the real world.

Maurice Cherry:
Yeah. I was doing research on one person. I’m not going to mention who it is because they’re in the book, but I was doing research on this person, and I asked ChatGPT, I’m like, “Okay, assume that you are a world renowned civil rights scholar. Tell me in two or three paragraphs who this person is, or whatever, and where I can find more information on him.” And one of the things that said was, “Oh, you can go to the University of Chicago’s daily library.” No, I think it was University of Illinois in Chicago. You can go to their library, and they have a whole section of his letters and all this stuff. I was like, “Oh, okay. I didn’t know that.”

Victor Ware:
That’s exciting.

Maurice Cherry:
Right? It’s exciting. I go to the website, I go to chat with the librarian, and I tell them, “Yeah, I’ve heard you’ve got this archive of letters and things. And how can I gain access to it?” And the librarian was like, “We don’t have that. Where did you hear that from?” I’m like, “Sorry.”

Victor Ware:
ChatGPT. Because a computer told me.

Maurice Cherry:
Right. “The computer told me that you had it,” and they don’t have it. I’m like, “Well, shit.” But it was good because at least it didn’t send me too far down a rabbit hole that wouldn’t have went anywhere. Now I’m like, okay, that was a wrong lead. Let me pursue something else. And research, I think, can be like that; sometimes you get sent on these wild goose chases. And I guess what ChatGPT at least helped me to do in this particular instance is cut it off at the pass. Oh, don’t do that.

Victor Ware:
Exactly. Exactly. Yeah. Yeah. I think just like we had to learn how to use Google, for instance, I think we have to learn how to use AI tools. I remember the first time I used Google, I was in the 8th grade. No, I was younger than that, I was probably in the 4th grade trying to research a project. I had to go to the public library, and they had to show me how to use the Google. It is weird now because now we all use all these tools daily. It’s on our phone, it’s on our work computer, it’s on our personal computer. It’s so ubiquitous, we don’t think about it. And I think that’s basically how AI tools will evolve; it’ll become part of our life without us really knowing. And that sounds scary, but it’s also something that we’ve seen before. For example, autocorrect. Autocorrect, we use it all the time. It’s the most helpful thing. We don’t have to remember how to spell long words like expialidocious or something. And yeah, it’s those little tools that are helpful, that are ubiquitous that we don’t notice until it becomes that part of our life.

Maurice Cherry:
I remember… I don’t know, maybe this was about five or six months ago when people started rolling out the AI avatars. And one, there were people that were saying, “I can’t believe you’re paying for that. You’re paying for that?” Blah, blah, blah, all this stuff. Which I think gets into a whole other conversation around people that are using these sorts of things and then going to humans, expecting them to alter or change or make corrections on what the AI has done. That’s a whole other conversation.

But the thing is that we’ve been so used to face app and face tune and some form of digital retouching and all that stuff that AI avatars are not that much of a stretch to the imagination past that. And because these models are trained on pictures that, honestly, we are putting online, people putting immense amount of personal data online-

Victor Ware:
There’s so much data, yes.

Maurice Cherry:
… through social media. We’re feeding the machine that’s making this happen, so can we really be that mad at it? I don’t know. It’s a really tricky conundrum. I think the ethics around it are still something that folks were trying to iron out even just on a personal level. I’ve had to tell people, even for the show, “If you’re going to send me a picture, send me a picture, don’t send me an AI avatar.” I prefer it to be you because we’re talking about you, we’re not talking about your avatar or whatever. But, yeah.

Victor Ware:
Yeah, amorphous representation of you. Yeah, it does. And that’s where I say it’s that scary part because I think we’re always pushing this line. And when I say we, I mean humanity as a collective, we’re always pushing this line of technology and what the next new thing, and we’re blurring this line between real and the virtual. It’s just going to get more confusing. But I’m hoping that we figure it out as we continue to do. I feel like in this time in history, it feels like technology is, by and large, a benefit. And I’m hoping that remains for the foreseeable future.

Maurice Cherry:
Yeah, that’s a good point. What would you say is the best thing about the work that you do?

Victor Ware:
I would say that the best thing is really being creative, is getting to work on new and exciting problems for a variety of people. And this is not just for where I’m at today, but throughout my career I’ve gotten to work on new things and that challenge me and allow me to think about problems in a different way and be creative.

I’ve always been a creative person, even since I was a really young kid and loved doodling and drawing cartoon characters. I would tape Dragon Ball Z, and I would pause it so I can draw the characters. I don’t know, it was a way to express myself and a way to just have fun. I’m grateful to be in this field because I can still have fun, even in my daily job. Even though it’s still a job, it’s still hard, it’s still days where I’m frustrated and burnt out, but at the end of the day, I’m grateful that I can do what I love.

Maurice Cherry:
Yeah. There’s some saying about how even when you think about what you’re going through right now, think about who you were 10 years ago. You would’ve wished to be at the place that you’re at now. It’s helpful to put it in perspective.

Victor Ware:
Yeah, I think that’s very true. I think about myself 10 years ago. 10 years ago, I was just graduating or I was probably still in a design school. And I don’t know if I would dream I would be in this exact position. Yeah, I am lucky in that regard. And even if you’re not where you think you should be or where you want to be, I think there’s so many different possibilities of where you could be, and it could be worse, or it could be better. But I think we have to be grateful for our situations and not lose sight of what we’re striving for but also be in the moment; this is a good moment, or this is a bad moment, and be grateful for it.

Maurice Cherry:
Yeah. Let’s get more into your background. You mentioned being really creative at a young age. Tell me more about that. Were you introduced a lot to art and design growing up?

Victor Ware:
Yeah, I think my mom, she raised me and my brother, actually, she was a single parent. We grew up in DC. My mom’s from DC, my grandfather’s from DC so we go way back. And she always encouraged us to paint or draw. She would spend time with us and make paintings. She loved to draw as well. I remember she would draw characters. And I don’t know, we had a lot of fun as a family doing that. She would take us to museums, we would go to parks. We had a lot of time to explore the world in a really positive way. And she encouraged me to be creative, she encouraged me to express myself, so I’m grateful for that as well. It really helped me just pursue what I wanted to do.

I was also really interested in science as a kid. I wasn’t sure if I wanted to be a scientist or be an artist. I really wanted to be an artist. And I feel like I met somewhere in the middle because I feel like design is very analytical, it’s very logical, but it also is very creative. I found a happy medium in the end.

Maurice Cherry:
When did you know that this was something that you really wanted to study and get into?

Victor Ware:
Yeah, I figured that out in high school. I took art for all four years. It was an elective at my high school. And I just loved it. I started looking up colleges. I was like, “Okay, I can actually go to school for this.” I really want to be an illustrator. That was my initial goal. And I got accepted to a few schools in New York and Chicago and DC, and so I chose to stay in DC. It made sense financially. The Corcoran College of Art and Design is where I attended. But they didn’t have an illustration program, they had a design program, so I said, “Okay, I’ll try this out.” I had already been experimenting with Photoshop. Or not really Photoshop, the free version of Photoshop. I don’t know if you know about GIMP or-

Maurice Cherry:
Oh, yeah, mm-hmm.

Victor Ware:
… you know about Inkscape. I didn’t have any money, I didn’t even have a laptop at the point. When I first went to school, I didn’t have a laptop for the first year. And I struggled so hard because you’re majoring in design and you don’t have a laptop. You’re going to have to spend extra hours at school working. I did that, and it was difficult. But yeah, I learned on the free software.

And I was just having fun. I was really into music. I still am. I really love album art, and so I was designing my own album art, I was designing album art for my brother, who’s also a musician. And yeah, that’s how I got into it. And I was like, “Oh, okay.” And I started learning about the fundamentals in school, and I was like, “Okay, I can do this. This is not that bad.” I know I wanted to be an illustrator, but I’m good at this design thing. And now I made a whole career out of it.

Maurice Cherry:
It’s interesting how there’s such a connection between design and music in that way, I guess, because they’re both just these pure forms of creative expression. But I remember cutting my teeth on doing fake album designs and stuff. I didn’t use GIMP and Inkscape, though. I’ve heard of them, but I used… Well, this was back in the day, I was using basically a cracked version of Photoshop that didn’t give my computer a virus or something.

But I would do that, and I would go to a bookstore, like a Barnes and Noble. And you know how they had those Photoshop tips and tricks books and all this sort of stuff, and those.

Victor Ware:
Yes, yes. No.

Maurice Cherry:
And they would have these big magazines, these $10 or $15 magazines that always came with a CD. I would copy the tutorials out of there and then go home and try to recreate stuff. That’s how I taught myself how to use Photoshop, how to use Illustrator. And I guess in the process of doing that, I’m also teaching myself about typography, negative space, color, things like that. And a lot of it was making fake album covers for groups that don’t exist, for artists that are not real people. Just taking a stock photo and being like, “What can I do with this? How can I change this around?” It’s interesting in that connection between those two.

Victor Ware:
Yeah, I was doing the same things. I watched so many tutorials online like psdtoots.com. I remember going in there and just like, “Oh, this is a new thing I’ve never tried before.” And it was just a lot of that. I was excited to learn and just having fun with it, not with any intention of, “Oh, I’m going to be this kind of designer, or I’m going go…” I just wanted to have fun. And like I said, I really love music. I was making my own music and making the album mark for it, and that was fun. And I saw that connection between them. But I’ve noticed there’s this weird percentage of designers who are also musicians. And it’s really scary because I honestly, maybe, I want to say two out of three designers in a room, and you’re like, “Oh, okay. You make music. Okay, of course you do.”

Maurice Cherry:
Yeah. I was a musician before I started getting into design. I played trombone all through middle school, through high school, in college, out of college.

Victor Ware:
[inaudible 00:26:00].

Maurice Cherry:
Yeah. Did you play anything? Were you a singer? Or what did you do?

Victor Ware:
I sang. I was in choir for a very long time. I taught myself the piano. I’m not a good piano player by any means, but I learned a little bit. And I could produce my own beats and things like that. And yeah, that was my outlet. After school, I would come home, rush home and spend hours making music, and then I would do some design tutorials. And that’s why it would always intertwine for me, you know?

Maurice Cherry:
Yeah. Now, tell me more about the school, about Corcoran. Do you feel like they really helped prepare you for the design world while you were there?

Victor Ware:
It was the oldest design school in DC. Very, very famous gallery. They’ve been around for a long time. And I feel like the education was very traditional. There was a lot of focus on print. A lot of my teachers had been working in design field for decades. I got a really good basis on theory, on history. We had just amazing teachers, even on the technical side. But I would say it had nothing to do with what I ended up doing. Like I said, there was a lot of focus on print design, which is good though, because I think you learn all the fundamentals, the gestalt, you learn color theory, you learn how to layout type, and so I think having that basis was really helpful.

When I graduated, I straight went to doing UI and UX design, which really, I hadn’t learned a whole lot in school. I had to learn a lot on the job. But I had that foundation that really helped me just get a kickstart, so I didn’t floundering. But I had to learn a lot about UI conventions. I had to learn about HTML and CSS and how those things work, and I had to learn what UX design was. Product design wasn’t a title yet, really. It was [inaudible 00:28:08]. And so there was a lot of new stuff. I was learning how to design for iOS apps and Android and what the difference was. But yeah, it was exciting, it was an exciting time. But yeah, I would say school prepared me to learn more, if that makes sense.

Maurice Cherry:
You were in school during the time when the web was really exploding in such a massive way. We’re talking about the rise of HTML5, we’re talking about the huge move away from table-based layouts to CSS. And yeah, UI and UX weren’t really even talked about as a thing yet. And that’s not to say they didn’t exist. I don’t think the terminology was really there.

Victor Ware:
Just wasn’t formalized.

Maurice Cherry:
Yeah, yeah, yeah, it wasn’t formalized in a way where people could learn about it. And schools, I can tell you schools were not on it at all. A lot of places were still catching up. I taught design for two years in, I think it was 2012 to 2014, something like that. And when I started, they were still teaching table-based web design. And I was like, “Oh, no, no, no, no, no, no, this has to be CSS. We can’t be teaching these students this kind of stuff, and then they go out to try to get a job and nobody’s going to hire them because all their designs are dated. We got to teach them what is actually being used now in the industry.”

And that was such a massive change, just even from a department standpoint, because they’re like, “Well, we have to change curriculum, we have to change tests.” I was like, “Well, you’re going to have to do it now, because the industry is…” Not only is the industry changing in terms of what is being done in terms of the languages and stuff like that, but even the browser itself is shifting from being something that used to be strictly presentational to now being a workspace; cross browsers compatibility, all these different frameworks and JavaScript libraries and all this stuff. The things that you’re able now to do in a browser you really could not do 10 or 15 years ago. It’s a massive shift.

Victor Ware:
Oh, no, no, unimaginable. Yeah. The way we work in browsers now was unthinkable. One, no browser can handle what we’re doing now, even close to… The speed of everything that’s developed since that time is lightning. Everyone talks about the shift from Web 2.0 to 3.0, but we’re talking about the shift from 1.0 to 2.0. And that was a big, big, big jump. I think the big players were just solidifying their stance in the playground, the Googles, the Facebook. That’s when they really became these big behemoths. But yeah, before that there was AOL and Netscape and Yahoo. But yeah, and no one had seen these Goliath companies, the Amazons of the world before. And yeah, it just happened really, really quickly.

Maurice Cherry:
Yeah. Speaking of AOL, oh, you worked there-

Victor Ware:
I did.

Maurice Cherry:
… for a little over four years. This was after you graduated from Corcoran. Tell me about that. Because first of all, I didn’t… I was doing my research, I was like, I didn’t even know AOL was still around. I remember getting the CDs, the American Online CDs in the mail as a teenager.

Victor Ware:
Oh, we had those, we had those, yeah. No, in the office they were still there.

Maurice Cherry:
Oh, wow. Okay.

Victor Ware:
One of my professors at the Corcoran College of Art and Design, he was creative director at AOL, and he was like, “There’s this internship. Apply.” Because I was a junior at the time. Yeah, that’s how I got my first job. And then after he left AOL, I ended up staying. I was just there for four years. And like I was saying, I learned a lot about UI and UX design. My first job was working on the AOL homepage. We also worked on AOL’s first news app that went in the iOS store and Android store. They hadn’t had… Which was crazy, they not had an app before.

And yeah, I learned so much in that job. As I was mentioning before, most of my education was more print focused, it was very traditional, and now I’m designing webpages, which I was like… I don’t know. I thought I was going to be working on a magazine or something. It was really fun. We had a really small and nimble team, and I just learned so much. It was fun. And the only reason I left AOL is one thing, they were notorious for laying people off, so I hanged in there as long as I could. And I did get laid off, but it was fun. Like I said, I really learned a lot.

And yeah, it was weird being at a place that I remember from my childhood and the dial-up tone and just seeing all that. And they had this huge campus in Virginia near Dallas Airport. You can see how big AOL used to be. It was weird to be in a company where it’s not at its heyday, it’s slowly becoming less relevant. But we were still working, we were working on things. We were still bringing out new products. We were still trying to compete with the other players in the game. I do enjoy the people I worked with and the time I spent there.

Maurice Cherry:
Yeah, it’s interesting about those old companies. We still have EarthLink in Atlanta.

Victor Ware:
Yeah. Really?

Maurice Cherry:
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. That threw me for a loop because I remember when EarthLink used to be in Midtown, it was a pretty big deal when it first came about. Now it’s a little bit further out in town. But I didn’t even know they were still a thing just in terms of it being an internet service provider. I was like, “People use EarthLink on purpose?” I did not know it was still around because a lot of those older Web 1.0 companies just either faded into obscurity or they just-

Victor Ware:
Yep. Or got gobbled up.

Maurice Cherry:
Right, exactly. It was just very few from that era that still were around. You mentioned this art director at AOL was actually a mutual colleague of ours, Ted Irvine.

Victor Ware:
Yes, Ted Irvine, yes.

Maurice Cherry:
Yeah. Tell me more about working with him. What was that like?

Victor Ware:
He was my instructor at Corcoran teaching after effects. He was very good at teaching. I’m not a motion designer, so he made it easy enough for me to understand. That was good. Working for him was really fun. He wasn’t at AOL super long by the time I joined. It was good to work with him. There was also a few other people I knew from Corcoran and that worked there. And it was just a good environment. We knew each other, we knew each other’s backgrounds, so we knew where we were coming from from a point of view. And it was very collaborative. He was a good mentor. He actually ended up moving to Espy Nation, which became Vox Media. And then I ended up joining him in Vox Media not four years later. It was just good to see him again then, and it was good working overall.

Maurice Cherry:
Yeah. It’s a small world. I think people who have been longtime, longtime listeners of Revision Path remember that we used to do some stuff with Vox Media back in 2015. I think, I want to say 2015, 2016. I was doing some consulting with their product team, and then Vox ended up being a sponsor of Revision Path for a little while so I got to go to the office and sit down with the team. Actually, I can tell this story now. I interviewed for a job there. Didn’t get it, but-

Victor Ware:
Honestly, I’ll tell you this. The first time I interviewed there, I didn’t get the job. I interviewed there twice.

Maurice Cherry:
Oh, really?

Victor Ware:
Yes, yes. Yeah. I went to work on the website, and I didn’t get that job. The job I did get the second time I interviewed was working in advertising, their custom ad, what they call Rev Ex. And then after a year doing that, they moved me to the brand team, which I worked on for five years.

Maurice Cherry:
I went through six rounds of interviews for I think it was the product team coordinator position. And didn’t get it, but after I ended up consulting for a year. I think you probably were there when Ashley was there, right?

Victor Ware:
Yes.

Maurice Cherry:
Because she was the product team coordinator.

Victor Ware:
Yeah. I was there.

Maurice Cherry:
Yeah. Yeah. Ashley’s great, by the way. This is no slight to her.

Victor Ware:
She is, she is, she is amazing.

Maurice Cherry:
But I went through six rounds. And I was so pissed, I was so mad I did not get that interview because after they were doing the consulting, a lot of the consulting I did was around DEI stuff. They were like, “Yeah, well, how do we get more Black people to work here?” And I was like, “Gee, I don’t know. How do we get more Black people to work here? I wouldn’t know anything about that.” But-

Victor Ware:
It’s interesting that you mentioned that. Actually, one of the last projects I worked on before leaving Vox Media was around their DE and I initiatives. And what we did is revamped it, rebranded it, amplifying voices to make sure that, one, we’re focusing that message of how we are incorporating more diversity into the work, and then two, making sure that’s loud and clear too, both internally and externally. And that was a very meaningful project to me. I work with who’s the head of DE and I. I think he’s still there, Chris. Very, very inspirational person. And yeah, I think they really took it serious.

But yeah, it is very important to make sure you don’t just have one type of person in design field and in the tech field in general, and have that opening up for doors for people like me who probably traditionally, we didn’t get those opportunities/ or I didn’t even know design was an option really growing up until I started looking. And that was just by happenstance that I ended up in graphic design because, like I said, I was going to go a whole different route. But yeah, I’m hoping that projects like that continue to open the doors for people who don’t get those opportunities normally.

Maurice Cherry:
Yeah. I think the person you’re talking about is Chris Claremont, right?

Victor Ware:
Yes. Chris Claremont, yes.

Maurice Cherry:
Yeah. And for folks listening, not the X-Men Chris Claremont, though it is spelled the same. But yeah, no, I don’t think I knew Chris. Chris might have been a little bit after the time that I worked with them, but I do remember, and this was something… Again, I can talk about this now because the NDA is up, but at the time I remember going in talking with the product team, and they had nothing in terms of diversity and inclusion stuff. They didn’t even no have a survey, didn’t know how many people of color worked in the product team. I was like, “Okay, let’s start there. Let’s do that first.”

Victor Ware:
We had our own Slack channel just for the Black people that worked there. And we kept count; we knew exactly. But it was a problem, it was a problem, I have to say that. And I think it took them time to recognize that. Vox Media is one of those companies that, especially because they have Vox, it was one of those progressive companies, you knew, okay, they have these values. And I think what happens with sometimes is that they don’t see their blind spots. You know what I mean?

Maurice Cherry:
Yeah.

Victor Ware:
It’s hard because you’re like, “Okay, we’re doing all this great work, we’re progressive.” But it’s like, no, we still have work to do. Just because we’re pushing these progressive ideas and we’re moving forward doesn’t mean we don’t also have work to do. I think that’s what we all have to remember no matter where we’re working, no matter what we’re doing is that we all have work to do. We still are not where we need to be.

Maurice Cherry:
Yeah, absolutely. A lot of companies back then during that period, that was a very common thing. Because I think the Clarion call was really starting to go out in the tech community around that time about diversity and inclusion, but in a way that made everyone accountable. You started to see statistics about the percentage of people of color on workforces and things like this, and companies were really trying to find ways to implement different programs or things of that nature to really increase that. Yeah, that was really emblematic of that time. And speaking of which, and not to go too much more, I know we’ve talked a lot about Vox and I don’t want to skip this part, right before you left AOL and before you went over to Vox, you started your own studio called Studio Never Sleeps. What made you decide to strike out on your own like that?

Victor Ware:
I actually always wanted to be an entrepreneur. And this was a dream that I had from when I was a kid, so it was partially that. It was also partially because I needed some money. Like I said, I grew up poor. I didn’t have a lot of money growing up. Even after design school, I had bills to pay. I was in debt. I wanted to be more self-sufficient. One thing about being laid off of a job, you realize, oh, nothing’s permanent, nothing’s permanent. Nothing’s really guaranteed unless you build something for yourself. Partially, that was a reaction to that.

And then also, like I said, I really wanted to have my own vision and do things my way. It was a good run where I was doing freelance. I was doing really small projects. After a while, I started building regular clients, I started working on larger projects, on web design. A lot of the projects I was doing back then was web design. And it became a thing. After AOL, I had to find more employment. I ended up working at USA Today as a freelancer under the Studio Never Sleeps moniker, and as a contractor. That was also a very great experience of running a business and having other projects, but it was really great to have one client also that I knew I could count on that continual check. It was something that I’m grateful for that I took a chance and learned a lot about how to manage books and how to write proposals, how to put together presentation decks. It was hard. It’s not easy being a freelancer, so I applaud anyone that actually runs a creative agency or runs their own business. But yeah, it’s still a goal of mine to be able to one day have a fully fledged business and be able to hire people, be able to create opportunities for other people.

Maurice Cherry:
How was it balancing full-time work and doing these freelance works at your studio?

Victor Ware:
it was a lot of working at night. I had a full-time job working at a day, and then meeting with clients at night. I had a business center at my apartment complex, and I would have clients come by, “I need this logo for this thing.” And it was crazy, looking back at it. I think I was just hungry. I was a lot younger, and I was like, “Okay, I can do this. I can stay up. I can do 12-hour days, I can do 15-hour days.” But it did take a toll. It’s not easy keeping track of all that stuff and constantly trying to find clients and working around deadlines. But I made it work, just a lot of sleepless nights. That’s the joke in the name of the-

Maurice Cherry:
Of the name, Studio Never Sleeps?

Victor Ware:
Yeah, yeah, because I was not sleeping.

Maurice Cherry:
Wow. I remember those early days when I had my studio trying to… I would tell people, “The great thing about being an entrepreneur is that you always work half days, any 12 hours you want.” And it’s true. You sometimes just get so into it. And you’re doing everything yourself until you manage to get a network or build out a team. It’s a lot to try to pull together.

Victor Ware:
Yeah, it is.

Maurice Cherry:
And now you’re at Wide Eye. Now you’re doing this great work as an art director. What advice would you give to someone that’s listening to this, they’re hearing your story and they want to follow in your example and become an art director? What would you tell them?

Victor Ware:
Yeah. I would say there’s no one path to getting to this field, to this job, or even my role specifically. I think a lot of people are trying to… When they see someone in a place they want to be, they want replicate it exactly. And I would say that there’s so many routes to this. I think the main thing is dedication to learning and to growing. And when I say learning, I don’t mean you have to go to design school, I don’t mean you have to go on online and look up tutorials. There’s so many different ways, whether it’s a bootcamp, whether you’re just drawing and teaching yourself or you’re just playing around on free design programs like I did. Some of the best designers I know didn’t go to design school. Some of the best designers I know went to graduate school, or some of the designers I know we’re doing something totally different before they decided design was their passion. There’s no one road.

And I think that can be freeing a little bit because to know that you can carve your own path is, for me at least, I think a great thing to know, that you don’t have to do this one way. You don’t have to go to design school and then go intern at this agency, and then get this child at AOL. No, you don’t have to do all that, you can start today and decide you want to be a designer. Or if you want to shift careers, you can do that and start. I think the most important thing is starting and being humble and saying, “Okay, I have to learn,” and being happy to learn.

Maurice Cherry:
Who are some of your influences for your creative work? Who inspires you?

Victor Ware:
I would say a guy I work with, Alex Medina, he is a super talented creative director. We work together at Vox Media. I love his work. A lot of people that I went to design school with or art school with are working artists now, and their work is amazing. I really love just seeing what’s coming up. There’s a young designer, Josiah, who’s been doing a lot of stuff for music industry, album art. I love seeing that type of stuff. I gather an inspiration from all the up and coming designers, people who are just hungry and willing to try something different and new. And so that gives me a lot of energy and makes me want to just do something different.

Maurice Cherry:
At this stage of where you’re at in your career, when you look back over the past 10 years from Corcoran to AOL to Vox to now, do you feel creatively satisfied?

Victor Ware:
That’s a hard question. I think yes and no. Yes, I feel satisfied that I’m able to create and I’m able to express myself and solve these creative problems, but I think part of being an artist or a designer is a little bit of that never feeling completely satisfied. You’re always like, “There’s more that I could do. There’s another level I can reach.”
I think about painters who’ve painted the same subject over and over again but never really feel they’ve captured the essence of it. That’s how I feel like. I’m satisfied in the moment of creating, but after it’s done, I’m like, “Okay, what’s the next thing?”

Maurice Cherry:
Where do you see yourself in the next five years? What do you want the next chapter of your story to look like?

Victor Ware:
At this stage, I really want to continue growing as a design leader and helping the next generation of designers grow and find their own creative voices and become the best that they can be. And I really want to keep putting out great work. I want to make a positive difference in the world. That’s something I truly believe in. It’s one of the reasons I’m at Wide Eye is because they, all of them, everyone that works there truly believes in design for good. And I think that’s where I want to be. I want to keep doing design that will be a positive net good on the world.

Maurice Cherry:
Well, just to wrap things up here, where can our audience find out more information about you, about your work and everything? Where can they find that online?

Victor Ware:
victorware, so that’s just my name, first and last name,.co. Don’t go to.com. That’s that’s a software company that I’m still trying to get the domain for. But yeah, that will have all my portfolio and links to my socials. That’s where you find me.

Maurice Cherry:
All right, sounds good. Victor Ware, I want to thank you so, so much for coming on the show. Thank you.

Victor Ware:
Thank you, Maurice. I appreciate it.

Maurice Cherry:
Yeah. Thank you really for just sharing your journey and design. It’s always good to see people’s progression and how they’ve gotten to where they are. That’s in part why the show is called Revision Path is to show the different sorts of ways that people can get to where they are, and so that’s why we have people from all over the industry. And I think it’s really important for folks to see how your hard work has paid off over the years, even starting your own studio and doing this while juggling the 9:00 to 5:00. I can see at each level of your story how you’ve progressed to get to where you are now, so I think it’ll be really exciting to see where you are in the next five years, see if you get to that point.

Victor Ware:
I appreciate it. Yeah, it would be great to check in five years from now just and see where I’m at. But yeah, I appreciate talking with me today. This was a really great conversation.

Sponsored by Brevity & Wit

Brevity & Wit

Brevity & Wit is a strategy and design firm committed to designing a more inclusive and equitable world. They are always looking to expand their roster of freelance design consultants in the U.S., particularly brand strategists, copywriters, graphic designers and Web developers.

If you know how to deliver excellent creative work reliably, and enjoy the autonomy of a virtual-based, freelance life (with no non-competes), check them out at brevityandwit.com.

Brandon Campbell-Kearns

There are so many options these days when it comes to learning how to code, but which is the best one for you? We all learn in different ways, and software engineer and educator Brandon Campbell-Kearns is just the person to help unlock what you need to succeed!

We spent the first part of our conversation on his business Quarterly Learnings, including his current web development course through Atlanta nonprofit City of Refuge. Brandon also talked to me about how first got into tech, and about how his stints teaching in Guatemala and Korea, as well as here in Atlanta at General Assembly and The Home Depot, helped guide him towards his current work. He even shared some great advice about breaking away from tying a job to your self-worth — something I think a lot of people can learn from during this current time.

For Brandon, understanding what lights him up has given him the drive to succeed. (Well, that and some lion’s mane mushrooms.) I hope this interview helps get you on the right track to finding your spark!

Interview Transcript

Maurice Cherry:
All right. So tell us who you are and what you do.

Brandon Campbell-Kearns:
My name is Brandon Campbell-Kearns, and I really like to teach. And mostly software engineering. That’s what I’ve been doing lately, so that’s what I am. I’m an educator and a software engineer, a hybrid.

Maurice Cherry:
Oh, nice. How has this year been going for you So far?

Brandon Campbell-Kearns:
So far so good. Coming up on halfway, feeling good about it, learning a lot about myself through this year, but for sure, really, really enjoying 2023.

Maurice Cherry:
How would you say, when you look back at this time last year, how would you say that you’ve maybe grown and improved? Have you noticed anything?

Brandon Campbell-Kearns:
Yeah, I think so. A lot of change has taken place. I think the biggest thing is self-reliance. And that does not mean a hyper independence where I don’t need anyone else, but more so jettisoning, previous dependencies that were helpful but not necessarily required in order for me to thrive and be my best self.

Maurice Cherry:
Jettisoning dependency, it sounds very much like what a software engineer would say.

Brandon Campbell-Kearns:
Right, I totally outed myself, didn’t I? Yeah. It’s either like, yeah, I’m a software engineer or a pilot, right?

Maurice Cherry:
If you don’t mind me diving into that, what are some of those things you’ve kind of like jettisoned?

Brandon Campbell-Kearns:
Totally. So I’m going to zoom out just a little bit to answer that. So growing up, I was a pleasure to have in class, as they say, you know what I mean? So a lot of my self-worth, I’ve outsourced into that progress report comment like, “Oh, how is he doing over this past nine weeks?” This is not unique to me. I think a lot of us had that experience, and then it’s like, okay, so my whole identity is being a good student at that point.

When I got into the workforce, it just became a paid version of that. So it’s like, oh, a pleasure to have in class turned into 2.5% increase or 3% increase and some shares or whatever it is. Now, am I upset about the incentives for working? Not at all. It’s just that for me, I knew that I was following that same trajectory that had already been blazed in grade school, and I needed to divorce myself from that cycle unless the entirety of my self-worth be wrapped up in my salary, and I did not want that feeling, and I did not like that feeling.

So this is something that I don’t tend to make very rash choices. I think about things for a long time, and I observe them for a long time to make sure that the patterns I’m observing are in fact correlated and not causations or the other way around causations and not correlations. So saying all that to say, in the past year, I left a job that was on paper, a great job, and even in practice a great job, but it was thus far, the zenith, the peak of that pattern that I was talking about of tying my self-worth to the prestige and the title and the salary.

Obviously, well, it’s not obvious, but to me it’s obvious. I was enjoying the work, but I wasn’t enjoying how I was viewing myself through the work. So I left the job in order to create my own thing. I got a little tired, Maurice, of getting paid the same no matter what I did. And I understand people hearing this, might think that that is an ungrateful thing to say or a privileged thing to say, but for me, I know what I’m working with and it’s like already having that foundation of maybe a bit of entitlement that I wanted to work through. So I’m actually using my career as a means of working through that. Because I mean, there’s nothing else. Not like there’s some other part of my life. My career is a part of my life, so there’s no way it doesn’t affect those cycles, if that makes sense.

Maurice Cherry:
When did you decide to leave your job? Was this last year?

Brandon Campbell-Kearns:
Yes. It was May 13th of 2022.

Maurice Cherry:
Oh, wow.

Brandon Campbell-Kearns:
So to circle back, those are the dependencies I was referencing, the sort of emotional dependencies that I’m jettisoning. And now it’s depending on me, my output. So currently, if I don’t have a contract after June, I won’t have money after June, and that is definitely much harder. But it’s also, it’s exciting to me.

Maurice Cherry:
It gives you something to strive for.

Brandon Campbell-Kearns:
Correct. Instead of waiting on a cycle that is outside of me.

Maurice Cherry:
Well, let’s talk about what you’re doing now, which you know said you started your own company. It’s called Quarterly Learnings. Talk to me about that.

Brandon Campbell-Kearns:
Yeah, Quarterly Learnings. Yeah, so it’s for sure a play on the… Very much related now that I think about it to what I was just talking about. So the idea of a quarterly earnings report or call that companies have, there’s one angle there, but it’s meant to be an appeal to that way of thinking. But we should now think about what we’re learning every quarter, what new capabilities do we have as an organization or also as an individual. And I think we should put just as much energy, I could even argue for more into learning in our organization as we do into the finances and the financial reports, et cetera.

So I created Quarterly Learnings because I’ve spent a lot of time with various organizations building out either internal learning organizations or actually just hosting and teaching workshops there. So I figured that I would create a business to wrap the freelance work that I do there around. So that’s what Quarterly Learnings is all about. For me it is a personal thing because it’s related to that, those cycles I talked to you about before, but also I know it can have an impact because I’ve seen it happen with the dozens of workshops that I’ve run at across organizations in industry.

Maurice Cherry:
How has business been going?

Brandon Campbell-Kearns:
Just getting started. Really good for just getting started. Currently teaching a class at a nonprofit here in Atlanta, which is really fun. So so far, business really just kind of looks exactly like the work I was doing before, meaning still teaching, but doing it in a company, with a big difference being now I have to send invoices and everything I do is representative of the business. There’s no one I can point to for like, “Hey, this is your fault.” Or, “I would like to have this.” It’s really, everything’s on me. The next client that I get will be because of either my past work or something I did to get them. So of course that’s a challenge.

But so far, so far it’s been good. I’ve also, with the name Quarterly Learnings and also just by choice, I’ve been able to also have a bit of a consulting arm. For example, there’s one client I have who wants to learn a little bit more about how to modernize an organization he’s working with. So I’m putting that under the same umbrella. So it’s not just teaching on a workshop level. It’s also a consulting component for me.

Maurice Cherry:
So you mentioned this nonprofit and this other business. What are the best kinds of businesses or clients for you to work with?

Brandon Campbell-Kearns:
Yeah, that’s a good question. I really like the idea of working with this very small organization who needs to have someone in their organization be multi-dimensional. For example, we could take the example of Home Depot. I know we haven’t quite gotten to talking about OrangeMethod yet, but that pattern is something I’d want to scale. For example, someone works at let’s say a retail store or a call center, and that person or that department may be about to undergo a reorganization or a restructure in layman’s terms, people are going to lose their jobs, but if they re-skill or have a new skill, then the value that they can provide to the organization evolves with their skills. So I like being able to stand in that gap and imbue those people who might otherwise not be useful to the company with a new set of skills that they can use to add value to their lives and also the company.

So for me, an ideal client is someone who has that problem, whether that is a large organization or just for example, a local law firm that has a few, let’s say, paralegals that they don’t need, but they do need some technology infrastructure to be built out. So let’s teach those paralegals then how to do that. Now they have both skills and the job that they may not have had since the organization needed to reallocate its capital.

Maurice Cherry:
I’m looking around on your website now. I see you’re on YouTube, you’re on TikTok. You have a podcast, and I want to get into the social media part in a bit, but tell me about the podcast. How does that sort of work along with what you’re doing?

Brandon Campbell-Kearns:
Yeah, totally. So the Quarterly Learnings Podcast. A lot of people ask me, what do you like to do outside of work? But I really honestly am obsessed with the idea of learning a new skill, mostly because I think, or I know that learning how to code changed my life, and I did not have experience with software prior to learning. So I really like preaching that gospel and talking about that so that others can maybe have a similar experience.

So so far, I’ve interviewed people either about learning or organizations that they’ve been in who have learning as a primary focus. What I’m doing now is starting to interview my students, a couple of my students in the class so that I can hear about their actual day-to-day learning experience with me as an instructor. That’s not necessarily the focus, but it is interesting to me to see.

I think that especially with technology, it’s not the same instructor learner relationship that we’re used to in, I would say, traditional education. So I really like being able to have conversations with my students that may not focus specifically on the technical components, but more on the emotional work that’s required to learn a new skill like software engineering. So yeah, that’s where I see the podcast going. We’re still in early days, but it’s so much fun. Shout out to you for doing this for so long. It’s so much work. Especially, I’m pretty sure starting out you were kind of doing everything and that’s where I’m at now. Soon I’ll have a team like you.

Maurice Cherry:
Yeah, starting out, I mean, I think it’s a lot different to start a podcast now than it was 10 years ago. I’ll just put it that way.

Brandon Campbell-Kearns:
That’s so true.

Maurice Cherry:
I think you’re on anchor, right? You’re using Anchor?

Brandon Campbell-Kearns:
Yes.

Maurice Cherry:
Yeah, Anchor didn’t exist back then. If you started a podcast, you put it out and there were a handful of audio hosts. I think I’ve been using the same audio host for 10 years now, Simplecast, but there were a handful of audio hosts. But the learning curve now. To start your own show is really easy. I think as long as you have a Spotify account, you can start a podcast. It’s not a big step to start making your own content that way.

Brandon Campbell-Kearns:
That’s true. Yeah, exactly. And for me, the biggest step was, to your point, not at all the technical stuff with, any of the hosting or logistics. It was completely behavioral. Like, yep. Just do it. You know the ideas. You’ve even written out the scripts. You have some guests, all right, let’s send some emails.

Maurice Cherry:
Send emails, and then get the timing together. And it takes a while at least, I think when I did it took a while to finally get into a good rhythm.

Brandon Campbell-Kearns:
Yeah.

Maurice Cherry:
Because the industry matured as my show went on. And so there were always new microphones, new scheduling tools, new this, new that, and you just try to find what works for your schedule because it’s so easy to just try to hop on whatever the newest thing is. I’ve used roughly the same setup for the past, I want to say five years. I haven’t really changed it a whole lot. Because I finally found something that was like, this is bulletproof whether I’m at home, on the road, whatever, this is what I’m going to use. Because there’s newer things that have come out, but I’m just like, no, but this works, so I’m going to use what works.

Brandon Campbell-Kearns:
Are you talking from an equipment standpoint or from hosting or just all of it?

Maurice Cherry:
All of it. All of it.

Brandon Campbell-Kearns:
I love that. You know why I love that? Because it’s so easy to get caught up in the hype cycle of having the latest, and I think I observe this a lot with my students. Like, “I have to learn the latest framework.” Or even in life, like, “Oh, I need the latest car or a pair of shoes or whatever.” And it’s like, maybe, maybe.

But it’s more important to me, I like to think about this idea of levels versus resonance, so kind of like a scaler scale up and down compared to one that’s rooted in a frequency that aligns with you. Because one suggests you have to get to the next level, and, maybe, but it’s usually those levels are externally defined, I found for most people. But if you’re thinking about resonance, then it’s like wherever you are, whatever the actual value is, you can resonate at that place as long as you accept what’s happening. So it’s like, okay, this equipment is working for me. What would be the point to change it? Unless I was trying to keep up with something outside of me, but you’re not, you’re running your own race.

Maurice Cherry:
Yeah. That’s one thing, and we’ll get to talking more about you and your work, but yeah, that’s one thing where especially doing a podcast, because there are so many podcasts out there now, you try to do what you think other people want. You try to model your show and you try to maybe do a certain release schedule or do a certain social media push or something to try to attract the audience that you think you want to have. Instead, you have to focus on the audience that you already have and making those your rabid fans because those are going to be the ones that will talk about your show on your behalf when you’re not there.

In my early days, I know I spent a lot of time trying to do, and that’s not to say this is a bad thing to do, I think it is still a good thing to do for beginning podcasters, but I remember reaching out to a lot of podcasters in the beginning, particularly other design podcasters and getting nothing, no response or getting a negative response. Because also I’m Black doing this and there’s not many, I don’t think I was the only Black person, but I certainly was one of few. So I was not getting a lot of good feedback from trying to reach out to other people to collaborate or maybe exchange guests or stuff like that.

It just wasn’t happening because of the one, I think because of the purpose of the show, and two, it was just a different time back then. I don’t think people realize back in 2015 how vehemently racist it was in the tech industry. Especially with trying to do something along with tech media. It was just people are like, “Why are you talking? Why are you even saying anything?” And I guess you would say now it’s a different story, but I don’t know, culture changes and society changes in such interesting ways. I feel like in a way there’s a bit of regression over the past year as it relates to some DEI. I’m using that in air quotes, but that sort of stuff. It’s been interesting. But yeah, it’s easy to try to model what you think is going to be the thing that will make you big as opposed to just focusing on getting better at exactly what it is that you’re already doing.

Brandon Campbell-Kearns:
Right. Dialing in. Dialing in on your own deal. Yeah. That’s good. I like that a lot.

Maurice Cherry:
How has social media helped with your business? I know you’re, like you said, doing the podcast, but you’re also on YouTube, you’re streaming on Twitch. You’re on TikTok. How does social media help out with your business?

Brandon Campbell-Kearns:
Right now, to be upfront, I haven’t gotten any direct leads from social media, but that doesn’t mean that it hasn’t helped with the business because in this case, as of right now, I am the business. So any sort of either validation or feedback or engagement I get with anything I put out online is helpful to me because I use it as input.

So for example, on my Twitch stream, I’ve gotten feedback about very tiny things like, “Hey, this audio sounds weird,” or “The way this is laid out makes it hard to see.” And even one of my students last week told me about how I had my OBS scene laid out and how it would be better if I had a smaller headshot of myself so they could see more of the code and they would also like to see what is happening there. So those sort of things are helpful because that really is the work. It’s presenting information. So any feedback around that is really helpful.

So those are auxiliary pieces of feedback that lend themselves to the point when someone will see a piece of content I’ve put out and say, “Hey, oh, okay, yeah, we could use that. We’d like to work with you to have a workshop on X, Y, Z.” Let’s say React for example, or how to do Flexbox in our layouts.

By the way, I’m not at all threatened by the prospect of them being able to just ask an AI assistant or chatbot or anything like that about how to do that, because that’s very possible these days and I think it’s a great thing. The thing that I provide is context within the given work stream. In other words, I can create a custom either curriculum or build out a prototype with a team that sure, an AI could do, but it requires a lot more custom work and inputs to the chatbots to make this work. It’s really difficult to replicate the in-class instruction experience.

Maurice Cherry:
And I’m curious about that because we’ve seen AI really, I think, enter the mainstream over these past nine months. And one application that I’ve seen a lot of people using it for is for coding. You can tell ChatGPT to write you a function or write a program, and the code that it spits out is decent, I guess. I’m not a coder, but from what I’ve seen, the code looks decent. Have you found that to be an impediment to teaching, or does that help out with what you’re doing?

Brandon Campbell-Kearns:
It really depends on the student. So I saw someone in my class using ChatGPT, and I love it except for the fact that they were using it to kind of check the box to paste like, “Oh, I asked it how to do this and it did it. I’ll paste it in and submit my homework.” That is not the best way for a human to use ChatGPT to learn something. If you just needed that capability, that’s exactly what you should do. Okay, it does what I want to do, but this person, they’re in the classroom to gain the capability themselves. So in that instance, still ChatGPT is not a threat to me, it’s a tool that I can use to help this person best navigate the information. So you still have to know where to put the things.

So for example, if we were carpenters, it’s true that here’s all this wood, here’s some nails, here’s some hammers, and here’s a saw. Let’s say those are the raw materials. That’s everything you need to build, for example, an Adirondack chair. I don’t know why I’m thinking of those, but if you don’t know either A, what that is, or B, anything about let’s say perspective or what the actual client wants and how to turn a set of requirements into an output, then having all that information or that raw material is not going to be as helpful to you. And then of course I have other students who use it well. Like, “Hey, introduce me to this new concept, this new framework that I understand the,” let’s say, CSS, for example, “I understand CSS, but I don’t quite know how to use Tailwind as an example.” ChatGPT can help you get there to remove some of the, let’s say, boilerplate and get you right to being able to interpret what its output is.

Maurice Cherry:
So it’s like a good partner almost, but not a replacement.

Brandon Campbell-Kearns:
Exactly. It’s your partner. It’s your, truly an assistant is how I’m seeing it. Now, is it true that there are some who might have overvalued the commodity of writing particular pieces of software? Yeah. So to me, software is a very much a humanistic in person to person game, and I understand that that might seem counterintuitive because it happens on the computer, but usually we build software with other people and for other people. So if there’s not a human input, there’s not going to be a very humanistic output.

Maurice Cherry:
Gotcha. Now you’re teaching both online and offline. I saw that you started back teaching in person in February this year. Tell me more about that. You said it’s with an Atlanta nonprofit?

Brandon Campbell-Kearns:
Yeah, so it’s with this nonprofit in Bankhead called City of Refuge. And what I’m doing now is in the middle, we’re about halfway through a 16-week cohort folks who don’t have any software experience at all, and they are, through a Department of Labor grant, able to attend this course at no out-of-pocket cost to them for 16 weeks every day, Monday through Friday, nine to four, and we’ll build four projects. The traditional bootcamp model, we’ll build a few projects, they’ll have the skills. As you may know, there’s no tests or anything to take for software engineering. So I’m viewing it as, of course there’s the skills component, but you also have to know how to market yourself in order to be successful.

It’s a good course, a good group of people. I’ve got about 18, 19 students right now, which is sort of a big class, but I’ve got two TAs who are fantastic, so they’re really helpful as well, and it’s just really fun to be back in my zone. I’ve taught online before, and it’s good because it’s easy to put people into breakout rooms. I have a little mini keyboard here that I can play in the meantime where we’re having transitions or if I want some sound effects. That’s really fun. Having said that, it does require me to be in this room or some room for an extended period of time, eight hours. That’s also true in person, but at least I can walk around the room, see what folks are doing, interact with folks, smell breath, that kind of thing.

Maurice Cherry:
Not smell breath.

Brandon Campbell-Kearns:
It’s an important part of the experience.

Maurice Cherry:
What do your students teach you?

Brandon Campbell-Kearns:
I think they don’t believe me when I tell them that I’m consistently learning. Even though I’ve been doing this for a little bit of time, coming up on eight years, I learn every single lesson, whether it’s a tiny nuance in the code or whether it’s some perspective about the code that they have that I just don’t, always learn it from them.

One of the biggest things I think is every single person has a different proclivity to dealing with discomfort. Some people have a hunger for it. Some people have an immense aversion to it. Some people are neutral. They’re like, no, it’s uncomfortable, but they don’t want to do anything about the discomfort. It’s fascinating for every single person that, let’s say, coefficient or that value is different. So for me, the fun part is seeing the different ways to navigate that, because regardless of the person, there’s for sure a moment where you have to face the feeling of, I don’t know what is going on here. This is such a new thing to me that I don’t know what it is. So dealing with that is fascinating to observe.

So I get to see different perspectives on how to deal with, in some senses, it’s conflict. In some senses, it’s like, I don’t want to use the word inadequacy because it has a risk of sounding like they’re inadequate, but the feeling of, I don’t know this and I want to, could be handled in infinite number of ways. That’s the thing I learned. It’s the different approaches to that and where I fall on that spectrum within things.

Maurice Cherry:
Let’s kind of switch gears here a little bit and kind of learn more about you. I feel like we’re of course learning more just through you talking about how you teach, but I’m curious to get your origin story. Are you originally from Atlanta?

Brandon Campbell-Kearns:
No, I am from North Carolina. I was born in Fayetteville, North Carolina, near what some people might recognize, Fayetteville for Fort Bragg, and then I moved to Charlotte, North Carolina when I was five, and then spent my whole childhood in North Carolina.

Maurice Cherry:
Were you interested in tech as a kid? Was that something your parents have tried to get you into?

Brandon Campbell-Kearns:
I had an interest for sure. So my grandma used to take me to computer expos as a kid. She was also my first AIM buddy. It’s really wild. She’s way ahead of the curve. So that’s what really got me interested in the idea of gadgets as a toy. Just learning about really just the interfaces. Wow, you can do this from nothing. It was really a whole new way to be interactive. Because up until then, it was just the TV and the radio and maybe let’s say an Etch A Sketch or a Lite-Brite for interfaces that you could modify and having something different happen.

So the computer was nuts to me because it’s like you get online, you click on something and then there’s some other information, and then when Limewire was popping, it’s like, oh, I can get music. So that was always really an interesting thing to me, but I was never a practitioner. I was always kind of a power user. When I tell people that I didn’t have any tech experience before I learned how to code, it’s true. But I was very, very familiar with the interface, like the computer itself. Itself was not foreign to me.

Maurice Cherry:
Now you eventually went to college at UNC Chapel Hill. What was your time like when you were there?

Brandon Campbell-Kearns:
Yeah, it was good. No, still no coding. I took a little visual basic class in high school, but at the time, honestly, I got turned off from the profession because, it wasn’t the work, it just didn’t feel like it was for me. You know what I’m saying? It just didn’t line up. I didn’t see anybody who I felt was cool doing it. Not to disparage anyone, but there was a lot of neck beard energy, if you get what I’m saying.

Maurice Cherry:
I get what you’re saying.

Brandon Campbell-Kearns:
And it just didn’t feel like it was for me. So I took a long, long hiatus, pivoting to college. I did nothing related to software there. I studied political science and Hispanic studies. That period of four years was, for me, I was continuing to chase prestige that I alluded to earlier. So I went from everything from a major standpoint, I transitioned all over the place.

First I wanted to be a business student, then I wanted to be pre-med. Then I wanted to do the pre-law thing. Really what I wanted was prestige. I wanted a good answer to, “What do you do?” And by good, I was not defining what good was. I was letting that be something that I perceived other people would say is good. I’m saying all this to let folks know that that’s not a good carrot to chase in my view, in my experience. Chasing after prestige in how other people might respond to what your job is a bad, bad journey. In my opinion. I’m sure there’s people who have done it and are doing it and it’s working out for. I’m just after a different thing, that internal resonance more so than external comparisons and validations.

Maurice Cherry:
No, it’s bad. It’s bad. I can say that. No, I mean, and the reason that I say that is because, and you probably have seen this too, there was certainly a time, I would say this time maybe is still going on, but certainly I think within the past 10 years, there has been this really big push to try to get kids to learn how to code. And that’s not to say these are bad programs. Shout out to Sure. Black Girls Code. I think there’s a Black Boys Code, all this stuff too. But those are good platforms because what it does is it at least gives them exposure to it to see if this is something that they would like to do or they would like to go into.

But the problem comes when it gets pushed on them to this point where it’s like you have to do this as a means of improving your life, getting generational wealth, uplifting the race. I’m probably taking a little bit too far by saying that, but these were the kinds of arguments at some point that a lot of people were pushing towards getting into tech. It was less about, “Oh, I’m doing this because I love programming, or I love building things,” but it’s like, “I’m doing this to be the next mega capitalist or something.”

Brandon Campbell-Kearns:
That’s exactly correct. I agree with you big time. I am team learn about software and technology and computing because it helps you to think and because it helps you to navigate the world that we’re in. It’s almost like if you’re a fisherman, you better understand at least a little bit about fluid dynamics because the way the water works and is this saltwater, is this freshwater? How are the fish going to behave? You can’t become a fish, but you can understand as much as you can about the environment that you’re trying to navigate in.

To me, software is like that, and I agree about the pressure that we might be putting on some kids. It just changes from, let’s say, oh, nuts that I’m old enough to say generation to generation and be able to reflect on another one. But when I was coming up, it was kind of similar, like, oh, he’s smart. People would love to be like, “Oh, I’m living with you when I get older.” And it’s like, can I get a place first? So, yeah, I 100% feel you about the pressure we might be putting on kids to learn to code as a means of changing the narrative.

Now, it’s true that it’s possible, but to me it’s way more interesting to look internally and see how we might be able to change our own personal narrative. And then what actually resonates with people is seeing someone who’s operating in their own frequency, who’s in their lane, that’s attractive, and then you’re marketable.

Maurice Cherry:
Yeah. So while you were in school, you mentioned sort of bopping around and trying out these different sort of fields. I saw that you talked for a bit in Guatemala while you were in school. What was that like?

Brandon Campbell-Kearns:
Yeah. Totally. It was cool. Just a short little two week trip. So I knew Spanish and this organization called Safe Passage, where the first week it was just immersive doubling down on our language learning. So I knew the language, but not in a native tongue way. So worked with the tutor for a week, and then the next week we were at a school, an organization called Safe Passage, like I said, had a school in this neighborhood that we would go to and teach the kids daily. It was really nice.

I think that was one of my early formal teaching experiences, and I kind of fell in love with the idea of it being an impactful thing. I think it’s pretty clear that teaching is something that has the opportunity to really impact someone’s life, but in that case, and especially with it being my first introduction to it, to me that became the primary reason to teach. It was because I knew that I was having, while it was very short and only a week long, I knew for sure that I was having an impact on these kids’ lives. Well, mostly because by the end of the week, they were crying that I had, that we were leaving.

Maurice Cherry:
Oh.

Brandon Campbell-Kearns:
Yeah. So that to me, shifted what education mean or what meant, or what being a teacher meant. It’s like, you’re not just up there passing the time. You’re having a big impact on this person’s life.

And I still bring that with me today, which is why I think it’s especially what I do on a day-to-day basis, teaching folks how to write software. The information’s out there. It’s not about me telling you what to do. It’s more about me observing you on this journey and get using my experience to say, “Hey, the way you’re approaching this might not be sustainable for your continued learning.” Or usually it will be some sort of a technical thing. But to me, I over-index on the, what some might call the soft skills or the emotional components of learning. But Guatemala was great, so I get a little excited when we start to talk about teaching because I go right to that. But to answer your question, Guatemala is a fantastic time. Would love to go back. Anybody’s going, I recommend visiting Lake Atitlan, and there’s a volcano not far called Volcan Pacaya, lovely. Walking next to lava, just underneath your feet. Absolutely crazy.

Maurice Cherry:
Lava underneath your feet. Not actual molten lava?

Brandon Campbell-Kearns:
Actual lava to where you can’t touch it. To where my little hiking shoes were getting warm.

Maurice Cherry:
Oh my God.

Brandon Campbell-Kearns:
Yeah. It was a little nuts.

Maurice Cherry:
Yeah, that’s a little nuts.

Brandon Campbell-Kearns:
But it was a big exercise in trust. Because the people who were taking us up, I saw people coming down. I saw people going up. So I’m like, all right, if hope it works out. It’s cool when they do it’s a problem when I do it situation.

Maurice Cherry:
Now, after you graduated, you also taught in Korea for a year?

Brandon Campbell-Kearns:
I did.

Maurice Cherry:
So how was that experience? Was it sort of similar to Guatemala?

Brandon Campbell-Kearns:
Yeah, it was very different from Guatemala. For me, I thought it would be easy because I was teaching English, and I knew and still know English. I like to think I speak English pretty well, but teaching English is not the same as speaking English I learned real fast. Because my students, they were kind of like expert students, if I can be honest. They were in school all day, probably similar hours to our students here. And then after that, I worked at what’s called the Hagwon, which is a private academy.

So from 4:00 PM to 10:00 PM I had students. So in three hour sessions, four to seven was the what would be equivalent to elementary school over here, students, and then 7 to 10 were the high school students that I had. So they were used to having those Hagwons after school every day, the private academies, whether it’s math or maybe software engineering or computer science or English in my case, or there’s physical fitness ones as well. So they knew what they wanted out of an instructor, and they knew how to be model students. So they also shared that information with me. Very critical of the teaching.

Not in a bad way. At first, it kind of rubbed me the wrong way, but then I realized, oh, this is feedback to use and grow from. Just because they’re 11 years old doesn’t mean that you can’t listen and learn from what they’re saying. I wasn’t thinking this then, but in hindsight, they’re customers that are giving me feedback about the product, which is my countenance in class. So it was very hard.

But since I had a year, it allowed me to have periods where I could reflect on my growth. I was not as self-aware then as I am now. And I think there’ll be a point in the future where I will be more self-aware than I am now. So at the time, I wasn’t able to clearly reflect on it as I can now, but I do know that I was able to, since I had a year, use that period as a time for growth. Even if I wasn’t aware of the growth, it’s still happening.

Maurice Cherry:
We’ve actually had a couple of people on the show that have taught English in Korea. I think the last person I had on the show was, I’m going to butcher her name…Matshoshi [Matsafu]. I’m going to butcher her name. But I did have someone on the show last year.

Brandon Campbell-Kearns:
A few episodes back?

Maurice Cherry:
Yeah, a few episodes back that she’s currently at Microsoft and lives in Minneapolis, I want to say. But she taught English in Korea as well. Did you want to stay after you had done your year? Did you want to stay there?

Brandon Campbell-Kearns:
Yeah, I did. I even considered going back once I came home. But here’s the reality. I’ve never said this out loud. I don’t know what happened, but I got fired at the very, very end of my contract.

Maurice Cherry:
Oh.

Brandon Campbell-Kearns:
Which, if I could just have a brief aside, I’m so hyped for myself that I felt feel comfortable just saying that without hiding it. Because I really still have no idea. And even, I wish I could know, it was 10 years ago, it was like a week or so before my contract, and they fired me. I have no idea why. I later found out some maybe not great things were happening at the Hagwon I was working at, that particular location, but I don’t have any ill will towards any of them. I’m just answering the question. I did want to stay and even considered going back, but once I got here to Atlanta, it was like, oh, well, maybe we could do something else. Let’s actually get a set of skills that’s a little more concrete. Let’s add to this.

Maurice Cherry:
So you left Korea, came back here.

Brandon Campbell-Kearns:
Was kicked out of Korea.

Maurice Cherry:
Was kicked out of Korea, sorry. What brought you to Atlanta? Why I go back to North Carolina?

Brandon Campbell-Kearns:
Right, totally. Okay. So here’s the true story. I was looking to for flights back, and the flight back to LaGuardia was something like $60 less than the one back to Raleigh in North Carolina. So I had an aunt that lived there, so I just called her. I was like, “Hey, I don’t want to go right back to North Carolina. Can I just kick it with you for a while?” So I lived with her for a year in the tri-state area, in Bergen County, New Jersey. And from the outside, that period would look like I wasn’t doing anything. For me, a lot was taking place.

Up until then, my identity was, like we talked about before, was being a student. My identity was that cyclical nine week he’s a pleasure to have in class a feedback loop. And I didn’t know what life was like outside of that. And even as a teacher in Korea, it was about giving that feedback, “Oh, they’re doing great.” And then experiencing life inside of an institution. That’s really what it was. Not to say to disparage that idea, I think the word institution might be loaded, but it’s the truth. I was still a part of a school.

So I needed a period of time where I was not that. I needed a break from that, and I really just needed nothing going on. So that’s what that year was for me. I was working in a restaurant, just trying to figure things out, become an adult. It’s my first time other than Korea being on my own, but also outside of, like I said before, an institution. Good year. For me that year is probably about detaching from needing others for every single thing. More about learning how to be independent.

Maurice Cherry:
So why Atlanta?

Brandon Campbell-Kearns:
I came to Atlanta because my sister lived here and still does. And I realized that I hadn’t spent that much time with my niece and nephew, and they were, let’s see, they were five and eight at the time. So made another phone call after a year in New Jersey and was like, “Hey, thinking of moving down to Atlanta, can I stay with you?” So she was like, “Yes.” She was on board. So I’m so so grateful for her for that year. I lived with her for about a year, and during that time I got a job teaching English online to Koreans. Not the same group, but this time it was online. So it’s on the phone 10 minutes at a time.

And that was when I said, “Wait a minute, I’m spending a lot of time online. Why can’t I be a person who is responsible for creating experiences online? What would that look like?” Because sometimes you visit a website and it makes you feel stuff, which is nuts to think about. I was like, oh, I want to be a purveyor of those emotions, or at least have the skills to do so. So I started to try to teach myself how to code through Code Academy and other things. I even have a notebook that I try to take notes in, but I quickly learned it’s not a humanities profession. You have to actually learn by doing, I should say. And after being a little bit frustrated with the experience for me working in restaurants and kind of wanted my own place and all these sorts of things, I finally decided to enroll in a bootcamp called General Assembly. And that’s when I finally had a career that I felt empowered by.

Maurice Cherry:
You were at General Assembly for a while, the one down at Ponce City Market, right?

Brandon Campbell-Kearns:
At Ponce, yeah. So I took the course for a year, the boot camp, excuse me, not for a year, for 12 weeks at the boot camp. And then I almost immediately started working there as a TA for the front end web development course because, one, I knew I had teaching experience and I had the suspicion that teaching web development would make me better at it, and I was correct. So yeah, I did work there for a couple years on and off doing sessions even after I had already started working at Home Depot.

Which I was talking about this with one of my current students last week, and they were like, “Well, why did you keep working when you had already gotten your software engineering job? Why were you working two jobs?” And in some senses the answer is, well, that’s what I was used to. Having to work two jobs in order to keep things going. So that was still part of my psyche, my DNA, of like, okay, well, we got to keep working. That wasn’t the case from a need standpoint, I would say there wasn’t a financial gap, but it’s just what I liked to do. That’s how it became clear to me, oh, you just like teaching. That’s why you’re doing it even when you don’t need to do it.

And even my manager at the time was like, “You don’t need this job. Why are you doing six extra hours a week in person of teaching?”. But it’s really because I liked it and at the time, it wasn’t obvious obvious to me, but it’s clear to me now that this is really what I’m about. Especially when I’m teaching in person, when I’m engaged with a person, and at any point on their learning journey, I get so excited because it really is like, you know how you see people on stage like a hypnotist and they’re watching somebody’s brain just evolve and their physical behavior and all that changes because of what that person is talking to them about or navigating them through? That’s how it feels for me. Like I am watching a state change in somebody’s brain take place in real time, and it’s fascinating.

Maurice Cherry:
Nice, nice. So after your time at General Assembly, you went on to work for The Home Depot for a few years, and you taught there as well. You were a founding instructor for their kind of internal employee education resource called OrangeMethod. Is that right?

Brandon Campbell-Kearns:
That’s right. Yeah. OrangeMethod was great. It’s still there. I think they’re doing a slightly different thing, but very much in the same vein, I had gotten a reputation for being someone who shared knowledge on my team, which was surprising to me. Coming out of a bootcamp, I thought, and this was the case, but I thought I would be doing most of the learning. That was for sure true, but I definitely didn’t expect that I’d have any knowledge to share. It turned out that that was the case. And I always tell my students that also. Software, it’s not 100% about the technical aspects because we’re building software for human beings most of the time. So one’s human experience is something to have as input into how the software’s created.

But anyway, I had garnered that reputation for sharing knowledge that I had. And one day someone DMed me on Slack and was like, “Hey, what would it look like if we tried to scale the work you’ve been doing on your team across the organization?” So I was like, “Oh, I don’t know.” Maybe for me, a starting point was, well, maybe we could have a similar structure as the bootcamp I experienced, but make it custom to what outcome we want those folks having. So I started with that and I put together a little pitch deck for the director who messaged me and presented it to him about a week later. And then about a year later, everything that was on that pitch deck became a reality. They actually built out a physical space, I think four or five, maybe six classrooms, built out a team and actually started a cohort in, I think 2017, early 2017. So that was fantastic.

Started out with folks who worked in stores. Actually, no, first we started out with folks who were internally already at the store support center, which is the corporate headquarters, and who already knew the internals of more or less a corporate environment and then gave them the skills. And then from there, we moved on to having store associate cohorts, which that was a lot more fun because it was also learning the corporate environment for them, and also things like they didn’t spend much of their day writing emails, but now a lot of the way to communicate is written as opposed to in the store it’s a lot more verbal communication. So overall a good experience, really glad to have worked there. It’s a great place to work.

Maurice Cherry:
I mean, I’ve heard really great things from people that do work there. And I don’t know if this might have been the case for you, but I’ve heard that there is sort of this pipeline from General Assembly to The Home Depot in terms of graduates ended up working there. Is that what happened in your case?

Brandon Campbell-Kearns:
Yeah, I was actually Home Depot’s first boot camp hire.

Maurice Cherry:
Wow, look at that. Making history.

Brandon Campbell-Kearns:
From a software engineering standpoint, they might have had some other designers, but I was the first person in the full site cohort to get hired there. And then from there, I definitely referred to a lot of people. So I’m really happy that they continue to believe in the prospect of having someone without, for let’s say, collegiate experience as a software engineer and having that be a thing going forward.

Maurice Cherry:
Cool. What have you learned about yourself through this whole process? I mean, it sounds like you really sort of caught the teaching bug first in college, and then you’ve continued to do it not just internationally, but then also here in the States as well. As you’ve been doing all this, and even now as you’re building your business, what have you really learned about yourself?

Brandon Campbell-Kearns:
Lately, what I’m thinking about is I’ve talked about the idea of chasing prestige before, and I’m still at risk for that. So the big thing that I’ve learned is that realizing a tendency or a particular behavior pattern is not the same as addressing it. So I still know that I have the tendency to seek prestige, and this usually manifests itself in doubting the path of really doubling down and tripling down into teaching and education, because I feel like maybe I should, in quotes, be a practitioner, someone on the field, and it’s a false choice. I don’t have to choose one or the other. I can be both, probably not at the same time, but I just have to get to a place and I’m getting there where I’m comfortable with the cycles.

In other words, okay, right now I’m in a teaching phase. There’s nothing stopping me from finding a contract position to learn more stuff or practice more stuff or build more stuff and then cycle back out into a teaching phase. So the big lesson there for me is self-awareness and accepting what you become aware of about yourself rather than, again, looking outward for my validation or confirmation that the steps I’m making are for me. Because I know they are.

Maurice Cherry:
Yeah, you’ll find the more that you get into your business, I mean, it is, I’d say for every person that starts a business, it’s an extension of their cell themselves. And as you build the business, you’re building yourself, you’re learning more about your ins and outs and how you do things. Especially I think once you build a team too, you really start to learn more about that. Because then, I mean, it’s not about you in terms of you having to be responsible for everything, but you now have other people that you’re responsible for in terms of getting other parts of the business done. So you have to learn how to delegate and how to manage, and it’s a whole thing.

Brandon Campbell-Kearns:
Totally. In your case, do you find your business actually behaves like you do? Like is it a scaled out version of you, or is it a part of you or something else?

Maurice Cherry:
That’s a great question. It’s a part of me. I’ll say that because I can be very, I guess eccentric is probably a good way to put it. I can be kind of like a little hippy dippy, a little woo woo, that kind of stuff, right? But then when it comes to business, I am the exact opposite. I am serious documentation processes, and that can be a conflict for people, I think, because they may know me personally and they’re like, “Oh yeah, Maurice is cool, da da da da.” But then when it comes down to business, I’m like, “Why isn’t this done?” And they’re like, “Oh, you’re different.”

So I’d say it’s a part of me because I do take that stuff very seriously. I mean, one because it’s my livelihood, so I have to take it seriously. I mean, that’s not to say that I don’t inject some levity into business. It’s not a complete Dr. Jekyll Mr. Hyde transformation. But when it’s business, I’m about business. And when it’s not about business, people that have worked with me and know me know that sometimes it’s flipping a switch. It’s like, oh, workday’s over. Cool, let’s go out. But when we have to get work done, we have to get work done. Because to me, one feeds the other.

So for me, it’s a part of me. It’s not a hundred percent me. I’d say probably when it comes to some marketing and even some communication and stuff, I can be probably a bit more lax than I would say be more serious. But when it comes to the actual invoicing and business and some communication stuff, I tend to be pretty strict and rigid. It has to this way. So it’s an extension. It’s an extension, certainly.

Brandon Campbell-Kearns:
That’s really interesting. Really interesting. Are you Gemini? No, right?

Maurice Cherry:
Pisces.

Brandon Campbell-Kearns:
Got it.

Maurice Cherry:
Pisces, sun, Virgo, moon. It’s the duality.

Brandon Campbell-Kearns:
[inaudible 00:55:24].

Maurice Cherry:
Yeah. So I can be very definitely creative, right brain, all that stuff. But then I’m also, when it comes to the business stuff, very logical, systematized, even to this podcast.

Brandon Campbell-Kearns:
You guys have systems in place.

Maurice Cherry:
These conversations are lax because there’s a tight system behind it. Right.

Brandon Campbell-Kearns:
Yeah, buddy. It’s lovely. I was loving all that. It’s fantastic.

Maurice Cherry:
Now, aside from your business, what are you obsessed with lately? And I’m asking this because you mentioned earlier something about Lion’s Mane, and so I’d love to hear more about that.

Brandon Campbell-Kearns:
Almost everybody that I meet and that I know I’m going to be around for an extended period, within the first day or week of knowing me. I’m probably going to pull up on you with a packet of Lion’s Mane and tell you to put it in your coffee or have it as a tea. Lion’s Mane is a mushroom. It is a legal mushroom. It is sold at the store. You can go to Whole Foods and buy some Lion’s Mane. You could go to GIAS Wholesale in East Point and buy some Lion’s Mane, local, Black-owned business plug.

And the thing about it is it has what they call it neuro-regenerative properties. So they used to think that if you lost brain cells, that was it. And side note, do your own research. I’m not a neurologist, but with Lion’s Mane, it has been found that it promotes new neural connections, which is really sick. It’s really important for learning too. And that’s all really learning is just making new neural connections. So I have it every single day since about 2015 I have it. And the way I describe it anecdotally to people is having a cup of coffee is like turning up the volume where having Lion’s Mane is increasing the brightness, getting a lot more clarity on just the lived experience.

Maurice Cherry:
I’ve seen people eat Lion’s Mane. I’ve seen them prepare it like a steak or something. I haven’t heard of it in a powdered form that you would drink though.

Brandon Campbell-Kearns:
Totally. Yeah. I’ve actually have cooked it earlier this year. Cooked it a few times, learning a lot about cooking mushrooms. You don’t need to put oil on them at first. You let them saute out. Because they already are full of water. I was messing up big time to start out. So you let them saute out, get the juices out, and then you go in.

But yeah, you can definitely eat them. I found out about this company called Four Sigmatic that makes a powder, but there’s lots of companies now that are doing this. The important thing is how it’s grown and whether or not you’re getting the fruiting body or the mycelium. I think so. And however, Four Sigmatic does it’s the way I like it. I don’t know which way it is, but how they do it is good for me. Because it doesn’t cake up in the liquid or whatever you’re trying to drink it out of, but a lot of the other ones get a little doughy at the bottom. You know how when you drink a mocha or something, the very last sip is just all the chocolate, it gets like that.

Maurice Cherry:
Yeah. It doesn’t dissolve fully or something.

Brandon Campbell-Kearns:
Correct. Exactly. But the Four Sigmatic one does.

Maurice Cherry:
I’m going to have to check it out. I don’t drink coffee.

Brandon Campbell-Kearns:
Those are my favorite words. When someone, “Oh, I’ll look into it.”

Maurice Cherry:
No, no, no.

Brandon Campbell-Kearns:
No, I’m serious. Because you’re going to hit me up like, “Whoa, this is really working.” I live for that moment.

Maurice Cherry:
No, because I drink tea. I think people that know me for as long as I’ve done this podcast know I’m a very huge tea drinker. Actually had a tea podcast back in 2015 at a daily tea podcast called The Year of Tea. So I drink tea every day at least two or three times a day. And the one I have in the morning is this mix of, it’s black tea, I think it’s like an Assam black tea and roasted yerba mate, and I’ll, I’ll have that together. It’s called Morning Thunder. And that’ll get me going probably for most of the day, probably at least until after lunch. It’ll get me going. Then afternoon I may have a different yerba mate tea or something like that. But no, I’m curious about the mushrooms. Because I mean, I really like mushrooms. I like eating mushrooms. I haven’t drank mushrooms. I’ve not had them even in the illegal sense, but curious about the Lion’s Mane, certainly if it’s anything that’s going to help with brain function and stuff. I’m down to try it. Certainly. And it’s organic too. Yeah, I’m down to try it. Sure.

Brandon Campbell-Kearns:
Yeah, you give it a shot, the brand, I’ll shoot you a link, but the brand I like is Four Sigmatic. They’re not paying me. Maybe they should, but they’re not. Four Sigmatic. Really good.

Maurice Cherry:
Have you had any mentors that have helped you out along the way? I mean, I feel like this teaching journey isn’t one that you’ve walked alone.

Brandon Campbell-Kearns:
So it turns out that teaching is a part of my lineage. My, I think it’s great great, maybe three greats, grandfather was a teacher and moved from, let’s say, migrated from Barbados to North Carolina, if I’m not mistaken, and started a school or was one of the founding people for a school. So that’s kind of cool. I did not know this man, but he’s like a mentor in my lineage, which I’m using as validation for the possibility. In other words, not only is he another person who’s done the teaching, but he’s in my lineage, so it’s that much closer. And not only do I know it’s possible, I know it’s possible with someone who has closer DNA to me than statistically everyone on earth. So I would say that story.

And then of course there’s lots of teachers down the line in my family. My grandma’s a teacher, my mom’s a nurse, which is not teaching, but it is still like hand-to-hand combat with let’s not use combat, hand-to-hand interaction with people. So I am really inspired by people who are good at that. My dad’s also great at that. He’s got a funeral home and a lot of that work is just hand-to-hand, face-to-face with people. That’s the work that’s required. So I know that I am for sure a product of those personalities and those experiences.

From a professional standpoint, that’s actually something I struggle with, Maurice, is I really feel like I’m on a journey for which it’s difficult to find comps. I also don’t think that’s a prerequisite for a mentor that they want to do the same exact thing you’re doing or you’re on the same path. But I’ve honestly struggled with finding someone with a path that I’d necessarily like to follow. So that might be a weakness of mine honestly, is reaching out and finding day-to-day help. And I don’t think I need somebody to say, “Hey, this is what you should do.” It’s more like, I like talking through what I’m doing, which is why I’m really enjoying this. It’s not even bouncing ideas, just verbalizing what I’m up to really helps to clarify it for me. So that’s probably my biggest need. And if that’s called a mentor, then I need one if anybody’s listening wants to hold me accountable.

Maurice Cherry:
I’m curious about this because we talked a little bit about this before we started recording because I mentioned that I asked you where you lived and you’re like, “I live in Atlanta.” And I was like, “Oh, I don’t really get to have that many guests that are on in Atlanta.” Outside of your students and I guess maybe some ex-coworkers or something, have you found that support locally? Have you been able to tap into some networks or something?

Brandon Campbell-Kearns:
In terms of just having a sounding board and that sort of thing?

Maurice Cherry:
Yeah, yeah.

Brandon Campbell-Kearns:
Yeah. So what I think happened, Maurice, is Covid turned all of the connection for me. It made me put it all in the one box, my professional box, and I did not really do a good job of nurturing a network of people to fellowship with about whatever it is. But I think it’s there and I think that I need to just put in energy into, I need to actually make an effort to reach out and create or build or find community in the area. Because I know it’s here, but for me, I just find often the motivation is kind of to the earlier point you were making, but kind of an adult version, often the motivation is like, let’s get this money, which is fine, right?

Maurice Cherry:
Atlanta’s very much a let’s get this money city, so I get it.

Brandon Campbell-Kearns:
Which okay, I’m on board, let’s get to it, right? But I think there’s so many more needs than that that people have. It’s not just like, okay, good. What if you’ve gotten to the money and you’re like, okay, now let’s sustain ourselves. Why aren’t there songs about that? So I guess the answer to your question is not yet.

Maurice Cherry:
I gotcha. What advice do you have for somebody that wants to follow in your footsteps? They’re hearing about your journey and they want to do that too?

Brandon Campbell-Kearns:
I’d like to think my journey is one that reflects and represents awareness of self. So I’ll answer it that way. But first, if there is anybody who particularly wants to follow in the actual steps, it’s important. If I’m looking back on my professional career so far, it’s important to understand what lights you up. If I wasn’t listening enough to myself to know that I really am enliven and fulfilled by teaching, then I probably would’ve stopped doing it because I would’ve been chasing again that prestige. So that’s the internal battle for me, like prestige versus fulfillment. It seems so obvious which one’s more important, fulfillment, but I still struggle with like, oh, that would be nice. People would love it if I said this right? And I think we all have to some extent a level of that. So for me, the journey has been about understanding and managing that.

And even specifically in my case, if somebody is learning how to write code right now and they really love, this is the first thing that’s coming to mind, let’s say fly-fishing, then you should be thinking about how to make connections or what are the metaphors or analogies between fly-fishing and software engineering that you can see from your perspective such that it becomes ingrained in your being so that you can sustain it long enough to make something out of it.

And I think that particular piece of advice I’m giving might seem antithetical to the idea of work life-balance, but I actually think that it’s more important to have an integration like a work-life integration because you, there’s no avoiding the fact that we have to work. You have to feed yourself, you have to bring some money to the table. But it’s going to be much easier to do that if what you’re doing is something that you enjoy.

So first, find what lights you up, then incorporate your skill into that thing. It might be that software engineering for example, or designing or whatever the actual competency is. It might be that thing lights you up maybe, but it’s so much better, I feel, if you can attach it to another thing that you can apply to multiple things. So I could teach English, I could teach software engineering, I could teach someone how to do a workout that I just learned. So for me, the [inaudible 01:07:28] is the vessel and what I put in it is up to me. So currently professionally, it’s software engineering, and that’s how I get paid. So that’s the advice. Find something that lights you up and add the skill inside of it.

Maurice Cherry:
Where do you see yourself in the next five years? Where do you want the next chapter of your story to be?

Brandon Campbell-Kearns:
I have no idea how it’s going to look. What I’d like to happen in the next short term period is I’m really loving in-person instruction and I’d love for that to take me overseas somewhere to a place I haven’t been because I just love people. I’m a big fan of people and learning about them. So to me it’s just an exchange.

So in the next five years, I hope to continue exchanging my energy with other people and using my energy to bring folks along, learning paths and journeys that they want to go on. And so far that’s been through software, but I wouldn’t be surprised if at some point there were other competencies or skills I found myself sharing with others to the end of doing something. So next five years, I hope to continue to be doing that and maybe traveling as an instructor to different places. Let’s do some live manifesting in two years. I’m so excited to meet everybody at the class in Morocco where we’re learning about building web apps using some framework that doesn’t exist yet. So I can’t wait to meet everybody in Morocco.

Maurice Cherry:
I like that.

Brandon Campbell-Kearns:
You like that?

Maurice Cherry:
Yeah. Well, just to wrap things up here, where can our audience find out more information about you, about your business and everything? Where can they find that online?

Brandon Campbell-Kearns:
Yeah, for sure. So available on LinkedIn at Brandon Campbell-Kearns. I’m on TikTok as Quarterly Learnings, and you can also hear about the podcast on quarterlylearnings.com. The name of the podcast is Quarterly Learnings, any of those places. I’m also on Twitter @campbellkearns_, and I’d love to chat about anything you want to related to learning, and especially if you have a group of people at the place you work that need to have a particular skill, I’d love to offer a workshop for them, whether that’s a small group or a medium-sized group. That is something that I really love doing in person or online, but I’d really love to meet you in person.

Maurice Cherry:
Sounds good. Well, Brandon Campbell-Kearns, I want to thank you so much for coming on the show. I think what you really had to say about kind of breaking out of these expectations to really discover what it is that you want to do, that’s a super important lesson for a lot of us to learn.

I would say probably now within this past year or so, it’s really important as people’s relationship to work has changed. Whether that’s been from leaving a job voluntarily, leaving a job involuntarily. I think a lot of people right now are trying to discover what’s next for them as they look at kind of this vast landscape of where things are going. And it sounds like you’ve really been able to tap into what speaks to you on a molecular level and use that to kind of put your gifts out there in the world, which I think is something that a lot of people are trying to find. And I’m really glad to have had you on the show to share your journey and to let people know about what it is you’re doing. So thank you for coming on the show. I appreciate it.

Brandon Campbell-Kearns:
Yeah, thank you so much, Maurice, for having me, and I appreciate you synthesizing my thoughts back to me. That gives me even more perspective. You’re good at what you do. You know this.

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Brevity & Wit

Brevity & Wit is a strategy and design firm committed to designing a more inclusive and equitable world. They are always looking to expand their roster of freelance design consultants in the U.S., particularly brand strategists, copywriters, graphic designers and Web developers.

If you know how to deliver excellent creative work reliably, and enjoy the autonomy of a virtual-based, freelance life (with no non-competes), check them out at brevityandwit.com.