hell’o monsters are colectivo futurists

  • Hell’o Monsters
  • Illustration Collective
  • Brussels, BE
  • Website | Facebook
We continue with a look at illustration collective Hell’O Monsters. Based in Brussels, the monsters are a three-piece group formed by graphic artists Jérôme Meynen, François Dieltiens and Antoine Detaille. The three have been working together for the past ten years and have amassed a stunning collection of drawings featuring curious creatures and monsters that are inspired by the astute words of Argentine writer Borges and his Book Of Imaginary Beings, as well as “the creative wonder of childhood”. For the most part their creations can feel a bit naive from a distance, but taking a closer look there’s a lot of symbolism and serious subjects to be found in their ultimately sophisticated drawings.

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CF: how did the three of you come together to form Hell’o Monsters?

Ten years ago we all met for the first time in front of a wall for a painting, we became friends by affinity of ideas and a strange sense of humor. We then started to work more together with really good osmosis. Three years later we decided to create a more coherent structure for our work and hell’o monsters was born. Initially our style was very similar and it became more inseparable to the point where people couldn’t recognize who was doing what. In this way we created a type of unique form for our idea, three people united as one.

CF: what is your work process like? do you come up with a concept and then start drawing together? or do you separate tasks to achieve the final piece?

We don’t always follow the same process, but usually one of us comes up with a general concept for a drawing or a whole series. Afterwards, everyone brings their own personal ideas and tries to confront and create dialogues with the others. Usually our drawings are composed by a lot of little things (and creatures) which together create one big theme. We don’t necessarily tend to separate tasks, instead each one of us does whatever is necessary in order to complete a piece.

”everyone brings their own personal ideas and tries to confront and create dialogues with the others“

CF: so far you have put your assortment of monsters on posters, books, shirts, and walls. which of these mediums is your favorite? which new surface would you like to explore in the future?

For sure drawing on paper in black and white with Indian ink is our favorite medium, it’s like the base for all the other things we do. At the moment, we are a little bit scared about colors because we have used them too much in the past, now we try to use it more carefully with a lot of attention to detail; but we love to explore a lot of different techniques and mediums, such as collages, painting on wood, etc. We are really interested in doing more three-dimensional things like sculptures and installations without necessarily ignoring the drawing side. Instead we are trying to find the best way to associate the two naturally.

CF: if you could soundtrack your work, what would you choose?

CF: what is your favorite thing about living in Brussels?

Brussels is a quiet city to live in, but with lots of cultural things to do. It is very stimulating to do our work here. We also enjoy our friends of course.

”we became friends by affinity of ideas and a strange sense of humor“

CF: which projects are you currently working on? what do you expect to be working on in the future?

Currently we are busy preparing two exhibitions, which will be opening soon. The first one opened this past weekend at the MOHS exhibit in Copenhagen. This is naturally consuming a lot of our time because we’ve been preparing a lot of new artworks: paintings to be exact. In the short future we want to realize a series of different sculptures; while looking further ahead, we expect to continue to work together in the same way or even better because so far our method has worked well.

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