Krishna Sadasivam

Artist Statement

Bronze age comic books, Saturday morning cartoons, pulp movie posters and vintage packaging design are all aesthetics that inform and infuse my work as an artist. I am drawn to nostalgia and the feelings that come about from it, for it evokes a simpler time in my life. Growing up in the US as the child of immigrant parents, I did not fit in so comics, animation, and even the backs of cereal boxes were objects of fascination.

The bulk of my professional work has been within the realm of sequential arts, whether it be comic strips or long form comic stories. Visual storytelling strikes a universal chord among people. It can viscerally move and incite people in short, it gets a reaction.

While the bulk of my sequential work has focused on the increased pervasiveness of the Internet and technology, I have also crafted comics with an autobiographical nature, touching upon the experience of being an Indian kid growing up in the US in the late 1970's / early 1980's.

I work largely within the realm of digital media, which allows for unlimited revision and immediate publication. Its fluid nature has a lot of appeal for me I can draft an idea and instantly share it with the world and revise it later as needed.

I hold artists including Chuck Jones, Rene Herge, Chris Samnee, Jack Kirby and Francesco Francavilla as some of my biggest influences upon my work. Much of my cartooning and illustration work uses limited color and favors bold, meaty linework, with a dose of pulp printing techniques and controlled minimalism. This economy applies to my animations as well.

The beauty of marrying art with technology for me stems from the simple fact that while tech is always forward facing, with it I have the opportunity to investigate and fuse what came before into my own work.

Biography

Born in Winnipeg, Canada in the early 70's, Sadasivam moved to the US when he was 7 years old. Raised in a staunchly conservative south Indian household, where rock music was held in disdain, Sadasivam's creative diet was instead fed by a copious collection of "funny animal" comic books and Saturday morning cartoons. In his early teens, he discovered MTV - where his exposure to Western music blossomed and grew. He is a consummate fan of 60's and 70's rock music and all things vintage and retro.

Sadasivam studied Electrical and Computer Engineering at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville where he earned his Bachelor's and Master's degrees. After 4 years in the chip design industry, he left the field and earned his M.F.A. in Animation from the Savannah College of Art and Design.

Sadasivam has worked as a professional illustrator for 20 years, with clients including Microsoft, The Smithsonian Museum of Art, Bandai Namco and more. In addition to a steady stream of client work, Sadasivam teaches as a full-time professor within the Digital Media department at St. Petersburg College. He and his family have lived in Tampa for over 17 years.

Exhibition History (CV)