BOISE, Idaho — As the City of Trees continues to grow, Boise is becoming a hotspot for those who like P.D.A. No, not that kind, but P.D.A. as in public displays of art.
When you get your head out of the gutter, look up at downtown's Freak Alley for Boise's very public and large canvas that's been improved by some of the area's best artists.
The Gem State is also home to syndicated cartoonists and under-the-radar illustrators and animators, such as Ben Konkol.
"With Illustration, you're creating something that is raw and really unique. And you are starting from the foundational blocks of design," he said. "I would describe my work as largely nature inspired, I try and incorporate a lot of organic, natural looking, physical textures into my work. I like a lot of detail, so my compositions tend to be really detailed."
Konkol graduated from Boise State University in 2017 and he first got into editorial and public arts when he took his first illustration course.
"That is when I became more interested and more serious about illustration and started drawing regularly and developing professional habits," he said.
Konkol's work has been published in The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal. He also created work based on articles from Mother Jones and Scientific American.
"How it starts out is I'll kind of send them a bunch of black and white value sketches, basically just to convey a concept. And I'll send them a ton. And then I'll illustrate the final direction," he explained. "They chose this one with kind of a shadowy figure in the background. And a lot of times I don't really find out which version is chosen unit it's live. It is very gratifying to see work on here that was originally on my iPad and now it's on the New York Times.com."
The Boisean was also honored by the Communication Arts Illustration Annual, which he told The 208 is like getting into an Ivy League school.
"I like to think that a lot of the super conceptual work is like super important or it could like change somebody's perspective or something, but I just kind of hope that it feels good to look at really," Konkol said.
The Boise State alum is about to unveil his biggest project yet. With the help of the City of Boise's Department of Arts and History and local businesses, Konkol is putting together a time-lapse video of himself creating his art. The video will then be projected onto the side of Boise City Hall at night, starting sometime this summer.
Konkol is also accepting applications for a new mentorship program that will hopefully give some guidance and validation to local artists who are pursuing a career.
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