Image via Complex Original
From anime-inspired characters to portraits of celebrities to whimsical designs, the creations that flow from the pens of these illustrators cover the whole board. These artists have been featured in popular publications, ranging from The New York Times to Playboy, and many have also contributed work to books and advertisements. Some have even illustrated for the big screen, like Michael Kutsche, who designed the characters in Tim Burton’s film Alice in Wonderland. Check out everyone in the discipline who's blowing up right now with our list of 25 Contemporary Illustrators You Should Know, taken from one of our favorite recent titles, Taschen's 100 Illustrators.
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Edel Rodriguez
Edel Rodriguez graduated with honors from Pratt Institute in New York and later completed an MFA at Hunter College. Born in Havana, Cuba, Rodriguez is inspired by the island culture he grew up surrounded by, as well as his life in the U.S. The cross between tobacco fields and city lights defines his work as an artist.
Alice Wellinger
Austrian-based artist Alice Wellinger creates her illustrations to tell a story through her art. As a self-taught artist, her work spawns from childhood memories. Wellinger has been featured in advertisements and magazines worldwide.
Liz Lomax
Liz Lomax graduated with honors from the illustration department at Parsons School of Design. She is best known for her unique hand-sculpted illustrations. Miniature figures of her work have been sold worldwide.
Michael Kutsche
Self-taught artist Michael Kutsche has a vivid imagination for creating unforgettable characters. He was the artist tapped for Tim Burton's Alice in Wonderland, and Kutsche also works with Disney Studios, Dreamworks, Marvel Studios, Sony Imageworks, Warner Bros. and more.
Anita Kunz
Throughout her career, Anita Kunz has been honored with a series of medals and awards for her intriguing art. Kunz teaches workshops and conducts lectures at universities and arts institutions all around the world. She has also illustrated many covers for The New Yorker, Sports Illustrated, and Time Magazine.
Gabriel Moreno
Gabriel Moreno has designed the delicious illustrations that appear in many familiar ads. Based in Madrid, Moreno graduated with a degree in Fine Arts at the University of Seville in 1998. His career as an illustrator spiraled into fame after the London-based magazine Computer Arts deemed him one of the 20 new talents in illustration.
Olimpia Zagnoli
Born in 1984, Olimpia Zagnoli started her career in art by doodling and later turned that into collaborations with major publications such as The New York Times. Her use of bright colors and round shapes separates her style from many artists. Fun facts: Zagnoli hates blue ink pens and reads the news upside-down.
Gary Taxali
Gary Taxali is most famous for his creation of the company Chump Toys. His illustrations won a series of awards that include honors from American Illustration, Communication Arts Illustration Annual, Chicago Creative Club, and many more. Besides illustrations, Taxali also travels to different arts institutes to lecture the aspiring artists of the world.
Peter Sís
Not only is Peter Sís an illustrator, but he is also an international author and filmmaker. Born in Brno, Czech Republic, Sís has synthesized all of what he learned from Academy of Applied Arts in Prague and the Royal College of Art in London and turned it into an impressive career of art. Sís now lives in the New York City area with his family.
Roberto Parada
The work of illustrator Roberto Parada has appeared in publications such as Time Magazine, News Week, Rolling Stone, Esquire, and more. His portraits of famous faces have spread all around the world and are in high demand. In 2003 the artist was diagnosed with aplastic anemia, a severe illness that he possibly contracted from frequent contact with studio materials. Fortunately, Parada was able to find a bone marrow donor and was treated and cured by 2004.
Joe Morse
Joe Morse studied the ins and outs of the fine arts at Ontario College of Art in Canada. Morse has received over 200 awards internationally. His clients consist of Nike, Major League Baseball, Universal Pictures, Target, and a wide array of print magazines. His paintings are made with oil and acrylic and later manipulated digitally. Morse has spent the last 10 years of his life teaching at Sheridan Institute in Ontario.
Simon Spilsbury
Simon Spilsbury's compelling work has a personality of its own. His background in advertising provides him with all of the training he may need when working for different clients. Over the last decade, his work has appeared in many ad campaigns and TV programs. Along with his talents on with ink and paper, Spilsbury also serves as a writer for the Sunday Times.
Owen Smith
Owen Smith has contributed to New York City's landscape by designing a mural at the 36th Street Station in Brooklyn. From paintings to sculptures, his work has been exhibited in New York, Milan, San Francisco, and Los Angeles. Smith is currently settled in Alameda, Calif. with his wife and children. He works as a teacher at the California College of the Arts.
Jody Hewgill
Jody Hewgill has been painting and illustrating since 1988. Her art varies from celebrity portraits to book covers to theater posters to interior murals in retail stores. Hewgill now teaches illustration in the graduate program where she once studied, at the Ontario College of Art and Design.
Patrick Hruby
Patrick Hruby is a freelance illustrator and designer from Los Angeles. As a child he dreamed of "running away to join the circus and becoming a trapeze artist." His art is composed of a variety of geometric shapes and lively colors.
Mirko Ilić
International illustrator Mirko Ilić has taught advanced design classes at Cooper Union and currently teaches masters degree classes in illustration at the School of Visual Arts. He has turned his career into an organization named after himself: the Mirko Ilić Corp., which was established in 1995.
Ronald Kurniawan
Los Angeles-based artist Ronald Kurniawan is inspired by ideograms, syllables, letterforms, beasts, and heroic landscapes. His clients include many corporations, like Sony Pictures Entertainment, Mattel Inc., Toyota, Turner Broadcasting System, Disney Consumer Products, and Tetra. His works serve as conversation pieces all around the world.
Zohar Lazar
Zohar Lazar has a wide array of styles from which he creates art. His work varies from complex designs to very simple pieces with less dramatic features. The artist has mastered the technique of two-dimensional kinetics. Lazar is a frequent contributor to The New Yorker, The New York Times' Sunday Magazine, and Esquire.
Daniel Lim
Daniel Lim started his career selling his art to pay his rent. He has called himself an "intuitive artist who relishes the spontaneity of the art and moves things as he goes with colored pencils and acrylics." His art is greatly influenced by Japanese culture and street fashion.
Karen Klassen
Freelance illustrator and painter Karen Klassen is known for her techniques using acrylics, oils, fountain pens, gouache, and Photoshop. Klassen loves to mix a variety of materials to create her masterpieces.
Kako
Illustrator and graphic designer Kako has won many awards, including the award for Best Illustrator of 2007 at HQMix. The artist dropped out of college to help an old teacher on his comic art classes and later worked as a web designer. Eventually his work in design led him to his career as an illustrator.
Brad Holland
Brad Holland is best known for his work featured in Playboy and Penthouse magazines. Holland usually illustrates using either pen or paint. His work has been recognized with gold medals and awards from the Art Directors Club of New York and the Society of Illustrators.
John Hendrix
John Hendrix's art is fixated mostly on popular culture, creating a world of unforgettable images. In addition to his art, Hendrix also teaches illustration in the communication design program at Washington University in St. Louis.
Jeremyville
Jeremyville is best known for his comic art. His work is bright and filled with fictional characters that resemble toys and characters from his childhood memories. Jeremyville currently works out of both Sydney and New York.
Maira Kalman
Born in Tel Aviv, Maira Kalman moved to New York with her family at the young age of four years old. As well as a passionate illustrator, Kalman is also the author of 13 children's books. Her recent projects consist of two monthly online columns for The New York Times.