Ahn Do-young is a collage artist and art director, who studies at Dankook University (DKU) in Department of Communication. His other stage name as an artist is “Doyo”. He is known for creating album covers like “OH MY GIRL’s 6^th Mini Album [Remember me]”, and “Baek Z Young’s Album [Reminiscence]”. In addition to these album covers, he is credited with many other works. Last August, he wrote a post on Dankook University (DKU)’s Everytime to help Dankookians (student of DKU) interested in getting into the field of art. The Dankook Herald (DKH) interviewed Doyo to learn more about his story and to help promote his career advice with the students at DKU.

▲ Doyo, a collage artist and art director from Dankook University majoring in Department of Communication. (Photo from Doyo)

Q1. Can you introduce yourself and tell us a bit about what you are working on now?

A: Hi, I’m a collage artist Doyo. And I’m a student majoring in the School of Communications at DKU. I work in collage art-production, normally making album and book cover art.

 

Q2. What is ‘collage’?

A: Collage is an art technique. It normally means cutting many images and pasting them together in a collage, creating a new work. Actually, the collage technique that I use is little bit more complicated than that. Nowadays we can use computer programs to create collages, which really open up the ways we can express ourselves in our art. It is the same as manually cutting and pasting, but I have more layout variety options to choose from. I call it a ‘Digital Collage.’

 

Q3. Why did you enter the field of art and how did you start making album artwork?

A: There are two main reasons. First, when I was a child, I liked doing things differently. For example, even though I am in the School of Communications, learning about making and directing videos, I joined a photo club to learn more about taking photos. Later, these skills helped me produce great work. Secondly, I became collage artist naturally. It was just one of my hobbies. I wanted to express my thoughts, could not draw well. So, I choose collage. In the beginning, I did it for fun. Fortunately, one of my friends, a hip-hop artist, asked me to make his album-cover. I agreed and out together a project that expressed my thoughts. Later, other friends who saw my work also asked me to make their album-arts. It continued and before I realized it, I was known as a collage artist.

▲ Doyo's ArtWork : 'Nearby Oddness 2019.' (Photo from Doyo)

Q4. Collage art was a rare field when you started. Was it hard to develop your own path?

A: Actually, when I started, this type of art was in its infancy. There were few references to seek out, so it was hard to get help. I started from scratch. In retrospect though, the tough experience I had made me decide to help others interested in this field. Whenever I feel I’m stuck, I take a break to relax and then keep going.

 

Q5. I saw your post on the ‘Everytime’ site where you wanted to help students interested in getting involved in art-production. Why did you decide to reach out to Dankookians?

A: These days, entertainment markets have grown huge, including the music industry. So many people want to enter these markets. However, there isn’t any major that teaches students how to get involved. Instead, students are going to academies to learn about art-work production skills. I feel bad for those people because there is a big gap between knowledge learned from academies and real work. So, I decided to help those closest to me. At first, I helped my friends and then I tried helping more people by uploading that post. My goal is to see that my peers don’t undergo the same hardships I had starting out. I also hoped that by helping people get involved, the market would grow and change people’s perspective about the art. That’s why I uploaded post and decided to help my peers.

 

Q6. In your 'Everytime' post you said, "There are a lot of difficulties in preparing for this field." What challenges did you have and how did you overcome them?

A. There were two main things that I found difficult. First, I think I had a hard time because there were a lot of things I didn't know how to do. For example, I did not know how to write an art-work contract. The pricing was all wrong, so I lost a lot of money by underselling my worth. Also, it was difficult to build my brand through self-marketing. However, to overcome these difficulties, I referred to similar cases regarding the contract. I asked a lot of people in the design and art industry for advice. But I think I learned a lot from my own experience, though I think I spent too much money for my efforts. Secondly, I had a hard time getting outsourced regularly. There was a gap in my work. The art-work market is smaller than I thought, so it is not sustainable. I'm solving these problems by explaining or teaching people about artwork.

 

Q7. Are there any skills, that students who are dreaming of getting involved, should focus on developing?

A: Personally, I think it's important to keep trying to come up with new and creative ideas when planning a new project. And to do that, I think you need to access a lot of knowledge that is all around you. For example, there are people who just draw 'love', and there are people who express 'love' in a certain situation. Work techniques such as Photoshop are just tools, the last step is creativity. It depends on what concept you use to develop the details. I always ask myself "How can I portray this situation or scene."

▲ Doyo's ArtWork : Oh my girl 6th mini album cover. (Photo from Doyo)

Q8. Do you have any advice for people who are preparing for art production and creating their own album covers?

A: I'd like to encourage people to get involved in the creation of album covers. There are a lot of people like me who want to get involved, but they are hesitant. I'd like to say, "Just try it, whether you win the mare or lose the halter." If there's something lacking in the process, you'll have learned something you needed to learn. Just like soccer starts with the ball, you too must start somewhere. I recommend you read a lot of books that you are interested in to build creative ideas for new work projects. In my case, I read a lot of world history and myths, and when I work, it helps me a lot with ideas.

 

Q9. What are your plans for the future?

A: I do a lot of album covers, posters, art production, video ads, book covers. However, I still think my work is limited to music. I think I'll try to break away from this kind of framework in the future to make my work more visible to the general public.

   Through our interview with Doyo, we learned a lot about his experiences and the skills required for students dreaming of entering this field. We hope this interview will be a great help for Dankookians and we look forward to enjoying more of Doyo’s future activities.

오유준, 김민경, 임재도  dankookherald@gmail.com