Portfolio Review: Jesse Auersalo's Dark Designs Are Morbidly Captivating

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Ask The Dust

"The artwork was inspired by old and useless imagery that time has forgotten. I got through my old work and tried to find interesting close-ups from pieces that didn't ever work out or stuff that I just hated and never really showed to anyone. I did a collage out of these unwanted pieces of imagery to see how it would look."

Oh My God You Look Good Can I Touch Oh It's Fake

"This is pretty old and still one of my very personal favorites. At the time I was working with the series, and I thought I didn't have a clue what I was after. But as soon as I saw the first glimpse of the series in the magazine where it was published, I knew that it was alright."

Balloon Bear

"I'm a huge fan of Jeff Koons, and with this work I wanted to make my own version of one of his iconic Balloon Dog pieces. Where Koons wants to show us the impossibility of an inflatable toy penetrating through a metal fence, I wanted to see it as an opportunity to tell a story and get more familiar with the figure."

Sleepwalkers

"This work was exhibited as part of the launch of a designer collaboration held in New York in 2011. At first I wanted to call it Twisted Sisters but later on decided to go with a title Sleepwalkers, which is better suited for the mood. The jacket is by Dries Van Noten, both shoes are by Junya Watanabe."

Graveyard Blues

"My dad collects old vintage toys. I borrowed a bunch of doll parts from him that I would use as a building material for my illustration. The image was printed black and white on a catalog of Paris Social Club. Later on I added color to it, which I thought worked pretty well."

Handy Man

"It's a shadow play without a shadow. It's happening behind the scenes. It's the extras."

Cryptocracy

"Cryptocracy is Huoratron's first full length album. I had an idea that I would illustrate each track with a symbol of it's own then build a figure using these symbols that would work as a main illustration for the cover."

Notural

"I wanted to create a unique texture that would look like nothing else, a shape that wouldn't be from this world, an alien. In real life I took a photo of a plastic bag with a flashlight in a toilet. Then drew it."

Purple Wolf

"The series was heavily inspired by shape-shifting stories/belief in mythology, individuals who employ magical rituals to acquire animals as familiars, using those creatures' powers of illusion and spirit-possession to serve their own nefarious purposes.

"I worked with this series for so long that I totally lost track of weeks and months while trying to reach the desired result. The series luckily earned its place into Creative Review's Illustration Annual."

Surprise

"I thought this work was a great example of how a personal interpretation can take things to the next level. The image was first created for a campaign by a major shoe label but later was rejected by the label. I wanted to give it another chance, so I smashed the face into pieces, and the result turned out to be one of my favorite portraits."