For years, Awesome Art We’ve Found Around The Net has been about two things only – awesome art and the artists that create it. With that in mind, we thought why not take the first week of the month to showcase these awesome artists even more? Welcome to “Awesome Artist We’ve Found Around The Net.” In this column, we are focusing on one artist and the awesome art that they create, whether they be amateur, up and coming, or well established. The goal is to uncover these artists so even more people become familiar with them. We ask these artists a few questions to see their origins, influences, and more. If you are an awesome artist or know someone that should be featured, feel free to contact me at any time at theodorebond@joblo.com. This month we are very pleased to bring you the awesome art of…
Joe Kim
Joe Kim is an illustrator born in South Korea and raised up and down California. He studied illustration at Art Center College of Design in Pasadena and now lives and works in Los Angeles. His work pulls from a lifelong obsession with movies, comics, and pop culture, with an emphasis on bold composition, atmosphere, and visual storytelling. When he’s not working as an art director, he spends his late nights in the studio making posters, covers, and images for the kinds of stories he’s always loved.
JOBLO: What got you started as an artist?
JOE: My mother studied textile design in Korea so she was very supportive of my creative pursuits. I always loved to draw so my parents always supplied me with endless pads of white paper. I was drawing everything I saw on screen from He-Man, Thundercats, F-14 Tomcats from Top Gun and Luke Skywalker with his X-Wing. I then became obsessed with DC and Marvel comics copying everything I could from the issues I got from supermarket spinner racks and Waldenbook stores.
Who were some of your favorite artists growing up?
When I was a kid Jim Lee was god (also someone I admire very much to this day). Every damn thing I saw on those pages left me in awe. I was a 90’s comic book kid so Todd McFarlane, Rob Liefeld, and Dan Jurgens were some of my favorites. In college I started to really explore painters like Norman Rockwell, N.C. Wyeth, Drew Struzan, and Alex Ross. I loved painters that told a story in their work. I fell in love with Japanese woodblock print, especially Tsukioka Yoshitoshi’s work. I was amazed by how the linework looked so much like modern comic art but it was made in the 1800s.
I think my yin and yang artistic influence in my late college years was David Choe and James Jean. Choe’s work was done so fast and free, he could capture every feeling he wanted to express as if it was exploding out of his pencils and brush. While James Jean’s work was executed with such care and technical genius, the ideas were almost a free flowing stream of consciousness. I always wanted to find the balance between the two in my own work.
And with all that said, my favorite artist of all time is Alphonse Mucha. The way his artwork flows, his mastery of color and value, the spiritual and mythological aspects of his work is everything I hope my work to be. His work goes from highly graphic to painterly in all the same level of mastery. My art pilgrimage is to go to his museum in Prague one day.
Who do you really dig these days, follow on Instagram?
Always looking at amazing art but I’ll just pick a couple. James Jean is still my favorite modern day artist. His ability to capture the regard of “highbrow” and “lowbrow” audiences is what I think makes him a once in a generation talent. Sterling Hundley is someone who I also found in college whose illustrations blew me away. But more importantly I took his creative ideation class a while back and it was really amazing. The process he teaches will really improve the way you approach your work. He recently did the artwork for the deluxe bluray set of Kurosawa’s Ran and it was so sick.
What advice would you have for budding artists today?
That Photoshop brush won’t save you (I used to get asked what Photoshop brush I used every now and then). The only way you improve is consistency and the hours of work, or the “miles” they would say when I was in art school. The first step is the most daunting, you just have to take the leap. One lesson one of my favorite teachers Gary Meyers said was something along the lines of, “Your painting is going to look like crap in the beginning and you just have to accept that and keep going.”
What should we be looking out for from you in the future?
Some things are in the works but in general more work inspired by movies, comics, and pop culture.
Being a fansite, we have to ask you… What are some of your favorite movies/TV shows of all time?
My favorite movies of all time are Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, In the Mood for Love, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, and Dune 2.
Scroll down to check out some of our favorite art pieces from Joe as we continue to follow his journey across his website and social media hubs: Instagram / X / Threads / Poster Spy / Store
2001: A Space Odyssey
The Batman
The Big Lebowski
Boxer
Captain America: The Winter Soldier
Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon
Deadpool & Wolverine
Drive
Dune Part Two
Enter The Dragon
Eternal Sunshine Of The Spotless Mind
Everything Everywhere All At Once
In The Mood For Love
Kill Bill: The Whole Bloody Affair
Mad Men
Minari
Nuna
Past Lives
Police Story 3: Supercop
Sinners
Star Wars: Ahsoka
Star Wars: The Mandalorian
Superman
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