The Graduates 2013: Hooray! Our first grad – meet illustrator Edward Cheverton

Gather round everyone! We are proud to present our very first It’s Nice That Graduate 2013 supported by Represent recruitment – Mister Edward Cheverton. We actually featured Edward a while back as one of our Student of the Months when he sent in some of his truly fantastic jazz collages. What we love about Edward’s style is how he’s not afraid to show of all his workings-out and sketches, which when pieced together tell a pleasing story of colour, sound and, most importantly, fun!

Moving away from making projects based solely around jazz, Edward is now creating colourful zines and prints full of characters so sweet and funny they’re almost begging to be animated. So without further ado, here’s the man himself to tell us a little about his past three years – take it away Edward.

Why or who or what made you go to art school?

It just felt natural I think. I couldn’t conceive of being anything but an artist when the time came to think of careers. Making art has never felt like work for me; it’s always the most fun I have! Realising that I could study this at university (and also just Illustration, which is the most fun!) and turn it into a potential career just sounded perfect. I knew that Brighton was a great city and the illustration course looked fantastic, so it all just sort of fell into place!

What’s the best mistake you made when you were studying?

There was a point in my second year where pretty much every piece of work I did was about jazz music; my biggest inspiration. Everyone was telling me I should move on and do something else (except for a couple of people, thanks you guys!) and I didn’t, which at times I felt was a big mistake. But It was something I knew I had a lot more to say about (and still do), and I would have never pushed it further if I had left it alone. I have, however, learnt now to have a break every so often and work with new material.

If you could show your work to one person, who would you choose and what would you show them?

I did a book earlier this year about my family’s connection to steam trains, something that me, my father and my late grandfathers all had (and have) a love for. One grandfather was an engineer before the Second World War and worked in the train yards, the other travelled to work everyday on one, and my Dad is a big kid who has an awesome old Hornby set. So I’d love to show this book to my grandfathers, and have a reminiscing chat about steam trains with them and my Dad.

Can you give us one prediction about your work for the next year?

Zines, zines, zines, and some more models. I’ve gotten completely obsessed with self-publishing and zine making, I think I’ve made about 30 individual publications in the last two years. It’s something I really want to push further. I’m planning on starting a (very) small press in the next year as a platform for zines and books by me and some close friends. What I think will change however is the formats and printing of my zines will get more experimental.

What’s the best thing you saw in the last three years?

I stumbled across The Village Vanguard Jazz Club in New York last year, which is one of the best jazz clubs in the the world. Sadly I didn’t get to go in to see a set as I didn’t have time, but I had a big grin on my face for the rest of the day!

Represent

We are very pleased that The It’s Nice That Graduates 2013 is once again being supported by Represent Recruitment who are themselves celebrating being ten years old this summer. The graphic design recruitment specialists have developed a peerless reputation working with designers of all levels and matching them up with the right positions in some of the top agencies around. Represent’s support has helped us grow the Graduates scheme over recent years and we are thrilled they have partnered with us again in 2013.
www.represent.uk.com