A closer look at Stew's creative process
Can you tell us a little about yourself and your artistic practice?
My street name is Stew, and my artistic practice is multifaceted. I'm best known for my bird stencils, but I consider myself an "Infograffeur", a mutation of digital and graffiti.
What is your background and how did you get into design?
I think I've always been attracted to artistic creation, but the first time I saw graffiti was in 'Noway', a skate magazine in the 90′ and then there were the railway tracks at Saint Lazare, LUS, P3K, 73 AUDIO, tags in suburban train carriages and then the advent of the internet, my first computer in 2001, my registration with the Maison des Artistes in 2002, my first stencil in 2006, the "blue heron" in 2014, and then my studio in the Village at Ivry-sur-seine 5 years ago now.
In your day-to-day work as an artist, what inspires you?
Travel and people inspire me a lot, but at the moment it's rather difficult. Generally speaking, I like nature and Japanese prints, heroic fantasy novels, music... but it's the street that inspires me to paint, the public space is a playground that's familiar to me and that calls to me, a beautiful metal door, there's nothing better!
What triggers the creation of a work?
There's no real trigger, I just want to paint all the time. Unfortunately, we don't always get to do what we want in life!
Can you explain how you go about creating your work? What are the different stages of creation?
In general, I do my research, scribble on a sheet of paper, then go digital, draw with Illustrator, test the colors, print at the right size for my illustration and cut it out to make a stencil. From then on, I try to be as spontaneous as possible in my choice of colors and location.