CLEA 2010 - CE Battle Artist Feature: Igor Ventura from Brazil

Continuing with our daily feature of Finalist Designers and Artists chosen for the CE FINAL BATTLE for next week's CLEA 2010 [www / tagged], we have São Paulo-based Igor Ventura (of Red Mutuca) representing Brazil! CLICK THRU to find out more about his proposed CE-design and get into the mind of a custom-toy artist!

(FYI: CE is the mascot character of CLEA designed by StudioAiko and made as a toy-figure for the event)


TOYSREVIL: What was the genesis / design inspiration / concept of your chosen CE-design submission?

IGOR VENTURA: I thought it would be awesome to really go deep in the Thai world, and submit something that had something to do with their culture, instead of something more general. I've fought kung-fu for about 6 years, and that was kind the starting point of my idea. I realized that Muay Thai is the most famous sport in Thailand and a very important part of their culture, thus I figured a Muay Thai fighter would be cool. My inspiration for the character was Sagat, from the videogame Street Fighter, as I think that must be one of the most famous fighter in the world, even tought he is not real. And for the headpiece, I found that white elephants have a very strong religious meaning in their culture, and I thought it was a great way to give some sense of royalty to the character...


TOYSREVIL: What is your "Plan Of Battle"?

IGOR VENTURA: Sincerely, I have no idea. But my best ideas aways come when I don't expect them, so I think I'll just go with the flow, and let my subconscious do the work!


[Igor's Neandertown Executive Munny-custom won 3rd Prize for Kidrobot's Munny Munth]

TOYSREVIL: What are your design influences (as an artist)? How do you engage a custom toy / your process of work? What is your preferred or signature style of customization?

IGOR VENTURA: I am very influenced by graffiti art, even thought I have never painted a wall. But I live in Sao Paulo, one of the greatests places on Earth to get inspiration from street art.

I work as a designer at a video studio, so that influences me as well, as I always go after motion design references. Movies, TV and videogames are a huge font of inspiration!

I used to paint canvas before I started with custom toys, and my favorite subjects were always superheroes. I always had an eye for detail. My lines always had to be as clean and straight as possible, even though people wouldn't see them from a close distance. But I guess it was a essential training for me, as I strive to always make customs as clean as possible.



IGOR VENTURA: I think one of the greatest challenges when customizing a toy is to apply your personal vision to it, but not changing the original shape of the object too much. If you cut the ears of a dunny, it won't be a dunny anymore, right?... So, I prefer to analyze the object and figure out a way to use all its different shapes, incorporating them into the design.

(Here are) some images of my past work, that I think better represents my style. I started with custom about 3 years ago. If I may, let me explain about it a little. At first, I was following more of a political theme, with a concept of union of both the capitalist and comunist political visions. Since my family has a russian background, but toy art is all about capitalism, I tought that made sense. However, as the time went by, I realized that even tough it's a storng and nice concept, it was relatively limited, and would pretty quick get tedious. Not only that, but I don't think I have enough political knowledge OR interest to focus on that. I'm much more of a fun and comic guy, and I figured it would be a lot better to just be funny and nonsense, like I am. And that's the current state of my work, which I think gives me endless freedom and lots of different possibilities.


[Igor's design is part of Aarting Series 1]
TOYSREVIL: What are you looking forward to do in Thailand, and for CLEA?

IGOR VENTURA: I plan to visit some cool places there, try lots of different and bizarre kinds of food, meet lots of people as passionate about art and toys as I am, and have a great time!

TOYSREVIL: Share with us, Who is Igor Ventura? And what's next to look out for from you?

IGOR VENTURA: My name is Igor Ventura, and many people know me by my nickname in the KR forum, oggyboy. I was born in São Paulo, spent many years of my childhood at Ubatuba, a city by the beach, and came back to São Paulo when I got in to college. My fulltime job is at a video studio, but I also have a stucio with a couple of friends, Sergio Mancini and Luihz Unreal. We have been submitting many designs to all sorts of contests and toy platforms, só you never know when something may come up...