7/13/2018 index.html Sci-Fi, Superheroes, Stands, And Smash-Ups: An Interview With Artist NKN

Artist NKN has garnered significant internet fame in just around a year, with pop culture-inspired work like this early 'Rick and Morty' piece. [Credit: NKN]

One of the best things about being in a niche, blossoming fandom is finding the brilliant rays of talent lighting the path along the way. I knew when I first set eyes on his series of Final -inspired Jojo's Bizarre Adventure mashups, I had to enlist the work of NKN for my #30in30 project, going in-depth on everything #JJBA I could for its 30th anniversary. His raw talent mixed with a clever eye for creative combinations made me a quick fan, but his passion and dedication to the artistic craft show him to be an even more impressive powerhouse. I recently sat down with him to talk about his art, his passions, his projects, and of course plenty of .

So I thought I'd start kinda easy: tell me about yourself, how you got into illustration.

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"I started when I was a child drawing Street Fighter and characters, mostly just copying official artwork or tiny drawings on the borders of the page. But later I moved on to my own characters most of the time, which weren't very good, but that's always to be expected of your first creations.

I always had this dual influence from both anime and Western comics, mostly #SpiderMan and #XMen, and there was all the Image comics rage at the time, with Spawn, Gen-13, Witchblade, Savage Dragon, etc.

Image is mostly known for the Walking Dead nowadays, I bet. But Spawn and Savage Dragon are still around."

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Haha, yeah, I remember growing up on #Spawn. That edginess kinda bled into everything. So were you completely self-taught, or did you go to school or find a mentor?

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"Completely self-taught, just the occasional quick drawing tutorial in a comic book or those guest artist spots in Wizard Magazine. I also bought the book How to Draw Comics the Marvel Way: still very recommended, makes you appreciate the Bronze Age art in a better quality than what comics allowed at time. Also Drawing the Head and Figure by Jack Hamm helped me a lot. If you go to a drawing section at the library you can find either file:///C:/Users/Ben/Documents/Creators.co%20Articles/4344251/index.html 1/10 7/13/2018 index.html of these, but they might alongside a lot of not very good books, too. After YouTube became a thing, tutorials started to become much easier to find and I see them when I am curious about something new or a specific style."

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I've heard those recommended - The #Marvel one in particular. Are there any artists who you specifically would say you model your style after or who really inspire you to keep refining your craft?

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"Well, when I was a child I liked in general all the superstars like McFarlane, Jim Lee and the others (yeah, even Liefeld), but I think out of those I really liked Michael Turner's art, RIP. When I got a hold of the Marvel book I really liked John Buscema's art; he's very famous for his Conan the Barbarian stuff. And I was always mesmerized by Kirby's depiction of alien technology and worlds. Currently I try to see all of them in what they do better than others and also how they work with their apparent mistakes, as some artists don't draw perfect anatomy, but they implement it as part of their style. For Japanese artists I really like Araki obviously, but also Masamune Shirow (Ghost in the Shell), Yukito Kishiro (Battle Angel Alita) and even the fantasy-heavy cute art from CLAMP.

Yoshitaka Amano is also very inspiring, but so different at the same time, that I don't associate him heavily with or comics, though he made Vampire Hunter D."

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NKN's style often involves mashing up classic pop influences from the West with offbeat anime, as he does here, putting Dio from JJBA in a classic Batman pose, ala Jim Lee. [Credit: NKN]

I can see a lot of those different cross-references in your work. The hyper-real to the overtly-cartoonish. Makes a lot of sense, haha!

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"They all help convey something different. For example, I don't think 'Jojo' would work the same way drawn in a '' style."

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Agreed.

So while we're circling the subject, let's dive on in: what is it that drew you into doing Jojo's-related work?

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"Well, I got into Jojo the same way a lot of people did, with the PSX game. The first time I saw it was in Gamepro Magazine maybe. They were just showing “Coming Soon” titles and I saw this silver-haired guy bringing lots of robot spirits to attack, so it caught my eye there. I eventually bumped into a Japanese copy of the game and got it for like 2 dollars. I played it with a friend who proceeded to land a roadroller on me on the first fight. I thought it was so outrageous that I just needed to find out what it was.

There wasn't a lot of material on the internet back then, but I managed to get the essentials out of it and I never had enough. I was the typical Jojo fan telling everyone to check it out and getting ignored. [Laughs]

So after making lots of Jojo fanart and such I started to develop my own story based on Jojo myths and created characters and stands a long time ago.

And somewhat recently I decided to retake that project, given that the anime not only brough Jojo into the mainstream, but hyped me about it again. I obviously changed my original story and characters completely, but some things survived.

So drawing between my characters and Jojo ones, I've just kept at it."

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So you got in pretty early for a Western Jojo fan. Who would you say is your favorite character in the series thus far?

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"That's tough."

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Agreed. [Laughs]

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"It's hard to compare between the different parts. But I believe the ones I enjoyed the most while reading were young Joseph and Polnareff. They are very funny and at the same time very clever, so they go from goofs to badasses a few times in one fight and even the same page." file:///C:/Users/Ben/Documents/Creators.co%20Articles/4344251/index.html 3/10 7/13/2018 index.html ”

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An early work in NKN's crossovers, putting 'Stardust Crusaders' Jean Pierre Polnareff in place of Wolverine #1. [Credit: NKN]

Do you think you could cut down to a favorite part?

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"I would still say Part 3, it is deservedly the most popular. I takes elements from the previous vampire stories with the heavy gore and introduces the actual party setups and Stands. So it has something for everyone, even if some fights are quite weak."

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I can see that, for sure. There's definitely a reason it's a formula Araki came back to again and again.

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"Jonathan's story had a theme of solitude while Joseph had apparent selfishness, that's why they never really made a core hero party, give or take a Zepelli."

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I have to admit, the distinct lack of Zepellis hurts most arcs, let's be fair.

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"They are walking spoilers though. They would all be played by Sean Bean."

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[Laughs] Oh my God. I had never considered that.

How about Big Bads. Any villains stand out to you (no pun intended)?

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"Well, I don't really enjoy villains who are all bad, like "Let's make a toast, for evil!" You could argue 'Phantom Blood' is actually Dio's story from rags to riches to power and it is very interesting. Jonathan is barely more than an obstacle for him. Still, villains and heroes have to make each other look better, that's why Wammu and Kars work so well, as they just