You should definatly check out this girl now you made it to this page! It’s wonderful to see an artist with great imagination and wicked concepts.

Simple almost old fashioned color use and bold lines and down right zeal make Zeloot a firm favorite of ours. Below The Netherlands based artist tells us how she developed her style, her view on the ‘art gallery’ thing, and what rings her bells!

Also check out: www.zeloot.nl for more info.

FMCS: Hi Zeloot how’s things?

I am getting to a stage of what could maybe be called drunkenness.

FMCS: Please tell us a little bit about how Zeloot was programmed? If there are any bugs, upgrades, compatibility with other human programmers?

I was programmed by reincarnations of people that didn’t make it to the early 70s.

I had parasitic worms at the age of 7 and besides my parents first thought when I was born, that I was mentally handicapped, that same day my brother spontaneously developed a lazy eye which was only corrected by an operation some years later.

I am definitely badly programmed

FMCS: Where are you currently living? And do you work out of the same location?

In a mess, which always seems to follow me where ever I go. Currently the mess is spreading over the south-west of the Netherlands. I am living when I work and the other way around so ‘yes’, I work where I am living.

I am trying and have tried to separate one and another but since it seems to be so hard for me to work regular hours I always seem to end up in the situation where I sleep when I’ve drawn the day’s last line.

FMCS: What/ who / thing kicked off your interest in illustration/design?

I am not sure but I think it must’ve been Liberatore, Moebius and Robert Crumb that got me drawing again after several years of farming in middle-of-nowhere around Europe.

I was never really allowed to read comics when I was a kid so I was verrry old (26 years) when I first discovered underground comics and somehow I felt I’d finally found the perfect synthesis  of social criticism and “art” (or rather “graphics”) without the “pointing finger”.

I started obsessively  collecting and reading the comics of Daniel Clowes, Chris Ware, David Cooper and the Hernandez brothers (PALOMAR from Gilbert Hernandez is one of my top favourites)etc. I wasted a lot of time in making comics that never had a finishing line, discovering that rather than being a good story-writer it was the act of drawing lines that excited me more than anything.

At some point I was asked to do a poster for a local venue ( http://www.goldcoast.nl/garage ) and from there I got totally fixated on posters. I especially like the idea of seeing the street as a gallery and the music as a form through which to express myself.

FMCS: Are you exhibiting at the moment? Where can we see you? Also do you
plan to exhibit more internationally?

As I said above I prefer the street as gallery. I don’t think my work generates more value as platform of social communication by hanging on a white wall as opposed to its street context.

First of all the gallery-public is too much of an in-crowd that considers everything in the light of (elitist) cultural knowledge, secondly; my work is mainly about communicating something other than my own thoughts (so it’s not an expression of autonomous ideas or expressions). Third and last of all; there’s not enough galleries (in Holland at least) that would be interesting enough or carry enough integrity for me to consider exhibiting work there (I hate these trendy galleries focused upon “so-called-street-art”).

Once in a while I participate in US based shows, where there is a poster-culture that simply doesn’t exist in Europe.

FMCS: As well as the design style you got going on we love the conceptual
ideas. How do you generate this crazy stuff… vitamins / drugs

I generally work sober (well if bags of tobacco and copious amounts of coffee still fall into a category of sobriety!).

I am always jealous of people that make 10 drawings a day…I don’t work like that… I spend hours and hours at trying to get the right image on the right feeling…and I do lay a lot awake.

FMCS: Have you ever considered animating some of your work?

No and yes. Whoever wants to is welcome but I already hate spending all those hours at Photoshop finding the right colour-combinations. I have a slight tendency towards an eventual hate of computers.

FMCS: Can you pull a truck on a rope using your teeth like they do in the
‘Stongest man in the world’ contests?

No, there are easier ways to floss your teeth.

FMCS: Zeloot tell us what rings your bell?

Books, Cuban and polish-poster-art , very much music, human contact and salads.

FMCS: How do you find people respond to your work? What’s been the
strangest, funniest criticism you have received?

It’s always funny that people assume I am a guy and approach me as such. One time someone said he liked a drawing on my weblog (http://zeloot.livejournal.com) but said he couldn’t list me as a “friend” ’cause he had small children.

FMCS: Tell us a little about ‘Little Memo’?

“Little Memo” was a  monthly cultural filter for my city and one very near. I would make a new “little memo” girl on one side and my friend would describe a selection of the more exciting cultural life around here.

We would make 750 copies, fold ‘em and spread it around. It lasted for just over a year. Too many side-occupations and lack of money made us stop somewhere last year. (See: http://www.fuckinggoodart.nl/fga4.html)

FMCS: How do you kick back and relax when you are not working?

Well, that’s actually one problem I should consider therapy for; I am always working and never really relax. Though..it must be opening my book-packages of Amazon and going to concerts. I do go out quite a lot to hear music (check the list under the links section on my site)

FMCS: You worried about bird flu? How will you be protecting yourself from
this? Do you have a special vacuum suit?

I m not worried about that. I lived in a squat for 4 years with many dead and semi-alive pigeons and mice on the floor above me.

I probably have a really good immune-system by now. Besides it only supports my feelings about the insane way we deal with animals (and I like to make a comic like  “La Peste” from Camus).

FMCS: Let us know your favourite top 5 web sites?

I have problems reading on the internet so I mainly use it for watching and  listening to stuff.

www.paperrad.org
www.ubu.com/
www.cinemaposter.com/FSTallgal.html
www.gigposters.com
www.fortthunder.org

FMCS: Your favourite Pussycat doll? And what would you like to do with her?

I am a heterosexual girl so I guess I’ll not disturb her sleep.

FMCS: Any words of wisdom for our readers?

I like outlaws. I’ve always been thinking about how important it is to have an opportunity of exploration and experimentation… but unfortunately that’s not for everyone.

FMCS: Shout outs?

“Play yer one good song”

FMCS: Thanks for the interview Zeloot.

Site: www.zeloot.nl

Contact: info@zeloot.nl

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