design:related studio

Dutch illustrator and designer, Fons Schiedon, creates his characters sometimes out of the simplest of shapes and colors, bringing them to life using humor, dancing (movement), and street motifs.

One of his more ambitious projects, Kika and Bob, Schieden’s animated series, was comprised of over 4,000 original character designs/backgrounds/props. In it, Kika and Bob travel all over the world—everywhere from Texas to the Amazon to Japan.

Schiedon’s influence was largely dualistic. “When I grew up it was a split-screen situation between Hollywood and Van Gogh … art and hollywood and popculture, it all connected.”

When he got bored with digital tools, Schieden returned to painting. It was the next step in the evolution of his work (a trend that we’ve been noticing in the digital age).

On inspiration, Schiedon finds that it comes in two kinds (for him): One that makes you enthusiastic and want to create something yourself, and one that is “more like ideas floating around, more like a song you try to finish in your head.”