Featured Artist: Iwan_Sulis

Discover the unexpected with this week’s Featured Artist Iwan_Sulis. His brightly-colored designs are an encounter with something unexplainable and extraordinary; it is almost as if you are an astronaut discovering a bright yellow songbird in a far off galaxy. The artist’s self-described “fantasy surreal” style showcases a pop of contrasting colors and indescribable visions that leave you feeling as if you’ve stepped into a new dimension.

Iwan Sulistiyo is a 32-year-old artist from Jakarta, Indonesia. He jokes that he is “just a simple guy” who enjoys drawing, watching movies, and building robots. As a self-taught artist, he looks to other creators to find inspiration and guidance for his creative projects. He admits that much of his art is simply experimentation and that he is still working to understand what direction his style will take in the future.

Still, although he looks to other artists for inspiration, he confesses that it can also be “deteriorating” to his process because he compares himself to them and begins to feel discouraged. He must remind himself to see other works of art “as just another style not as a goal” that he must achieve. In fact, one of his greatest joys as an artist is the flexibility to evolve and the openness to pursue all avenues that interest him. He says that creativity is a “gift of freedom” and that every artist must learn to appreciate and enjoy that freedom.