Marylou Faure

0:01It's time now to meet our first speaker of the evening mary lou four is a parisian illustrator and artist currently based in london although tonight she's actually dialing in from spain her colorful and empowering works depict and celebrate the female form and have garnered fans around the world as well as commissions from the likes of lyft and spotify tonight she's going to be talking about how you keep focus as a freelancer and make sure your career keeps moving in the desired direction she'll also of course be showing some of her wonderful work as well so mary lou if you wouldn't mind turning your audio and video on.

0:31So we can say hello hi there how's it going yeah good how are you yeah very well thanks lovely shirt I've mentioned it before before we started as well.

0:42But yeah great show I think the best show we've had on nice tuesdays for a while it's the holiday vibes thank you exactly you're dialing in from spain is that right yeah yeah yeah I went to see some family there so okay amazing great great well listen I won't take up any more time so over to you really to present your screen and yeah just a reminder to everyone else if you have any questions for marilu put them in the chat and I'll try and try my best to ask them afterwards that's imperfect well hi everyone and thanks for the intro matt thanks also nice to tuesday for inviting me to be to be here tonight and to talk a little bit about my work so a little brief intro about myself I'm a freelance artist and illustrator living in london my style is very bold and bright and colorful and I will always include I like to portray the female body woman and any characters that are feeling good about themselves and feeling confident and empowered but what I wanted to talk about this evening is an issue that I've had to face for the last six seven years as a freelance illustrator which has been how do I keep control over the work that I do how do I keep control over over the type of projects that I'm creating and how do I make make sure that I'm going in the right direction. And if not how do I steer myself in the right direction because there's been a few times now in the last six years where although things were going well and you know.

2:11I was working on some projects and and I was pretty happy with overall the direction. There were some things that were making me a little bit frustrated and I felt like I wasn't doing exactly the type of work that I wanted to do or I wanted to try something else or I didn't want my work to be described in that certain way. And I've had to really take action and react to it to make sure that I could steer myself in the right direction.

2:35So the first thing that happened was when at the very beginning of going freelance because it was a start.

2:42And it's you know. I wasn't very picky with the projects that I was getting because I needed to work on as many as as possible to start with I was feeling a little bit frustrated because I wasn't really working on the type of projects that I wanted with clients the projects felt a little bit bland they felt a bit soulless in the sense that I wasn't tackling any issues that I cared about I wasn't I didn't feel like I was using my work to do something positive or impactful which which was something that I really wanted to try and achieve so because I wasn't getting that with my client projects I figured if I want to if I want to try and have my work perceived that way I need to I need to do it with my spare time.

3:20So I worked on a lot of pro bono projects I could you know contributed to any kind of any any association any charities any non-profit that were in need of a visual I would always try and and and get mine in there. And I was always also trying to describe my work in including the fact that I wanted to have a positive message at the core of my core administration and that was something that I really cared about.

3:48And so by really putting it out there pushing it on my social media and website and showing all these projects that had quite a core message that was important and that was talking about the issues that I cared about it took a bit of time but eventually it did end up having an impact on the kind of projects that I was getting as a as a freelancer with my clients and it then led me to work on loads of loads of projects that I felt really strongly about and the thing that I like about that as well is not not only do I care about these issues and I really do want to you know use my work to to have a have a voice in the matter but also I feel like it helps me to create the more striking work because I feel way more inspired and because it's way more motivating to to use your artwork to try and do something positive it leads me to do work that I'm actually the most proud of so it's also quite an important thing visually because it has an impact on my style and on what I create so yeah it led me to work on on on some really exciting projects this one was for end youth homelessness and it was a really interesting one and then something as well that happened quite quickly is that I my work wasn't exactly seen the way I wanted it to be seen because it's very colorful and it's very playful and it's very character-based and at the beginning when I was starting up my style was a bit safer it had you know my characters weren't as confident they weren't as naked and they didn't really particularly the same sort of attitude and it led me to have the comments from clients that my work was cute or childish or useful and I didn't want that at all I wanted my work to be targeting an older audience I wanted it to be more like my my age and I wanted my work to be more mature and cheekier and a bit more fun and so to do that I I was changing my website and I literally removed half of the projects in there. And I replaced them with personal work and all of that personal work were women loads of nudity loads of boobs lots of bumps and just to show okay this is what I do and no it's not for children and you know.

5:58I think that that worked nicely because what I really wanted to do it wasn't so much about the nudity but I just really wanted my characters to be I wanted them to feel more empowered more confident more more had more of an attitude to that.

6:12And I felt like if I went down the you know children's illustration I might not be able to do that in that in that sense I did have to dial it down a little bit because because I replaced so much of my work on my website with nudity and mature work I was starting to get loads of projects that were more about sex stories and porn and condom designs and that was really fun as well.

6:32But it's also not exactly the route that I wanted to take so I had to sort of dial it down and find the right balance between having a colorful style but it not being childish and having a central style but not being necessarily sexual and again that took a little bit of time but finding that balance has really led me to then have my work seen the way I wanted it to be seen and get the projects that I wanted to work on.

6:59And then lastly one thing that happened which is sort of an ongoing thing. And it's still in in progress is I thought I wanted to sort of escape the digital world a little bit because over the last seven years you know 90 of my work has been digital because that's really what you know that was what was available in the market that's what was needed and I was getting these projects and because I was just on a roll and taking them I didn't really realize that for a while but I was starting to feel a little bit frustrated because I was getting very very much of the same projects and I loved working on on sticker sets and it was really fun and I had some amazing projects with that but at some point it just I was just a sticker lady I just kept doing stickers it was the only projects that I was getting approached for and whilst it was fun I felt like I wanted to do something completely different actually I wanted to take that small illustration.

7:49And I wanted to burst it open have it massively painted on a wall or have a window display or have it in 3d and I felt like I was just restraining that in that screen and I wanted to break out of it so to do that I started by painting a door which is a couple of friends door in east london and they asked me if I wanted to paint it. And it was an important step because the last time I had painted anything was uni and it was pretty so I didn't feel extremely confident portraying myself as someone who could paint but I also knew that I did want to do that. And I had to just force myself into doing it.

8:30So I painted that door and you know it got some because some nice some nice reaction and because it was a busy street I had a few people who were posting about it. And it just gave me that confidence to think okay.

8:43So maybe this is something that I could explore and this opens up a door to a completely different way of using my illustration which was really exciting and what I was looking for so then after that once I had that first one I just anytime that I had an occasion to pitch for a mural I did anytime. There was a show any occasion really where I could say oh can we can we actually paint something or could we make something big I jumped on it because then it led it led people to see my work in that way.

9:12And then start hiring me for those kind of projects because you know while I still do loads of digital work.

9:17And I really enjoy it I was starting to get bored and I feel like this is such a it's such an exciting industry and it's such an exciting job. And I love what I do and if I start getting bored it feels it feels really wrong so that's why I really wanted to try something a bit different and that sort of led to me also working on more you know painting on on paper and on canvases during lockdown painting on anything that was in the house because I was so bored and again it's just it's a nice it's just a nice different way of using my artwork and and it's just it's just it just opens up a new new world from the opportunities of of using my art and on the last note it's also something that I really wanted to explore which was you know using translating my work from 2d to 3d which was something that I had never done and I didn't know how to do so I had to collaborate with someone but I didn't really I knew I wanted to do it.

10:16But I was sort of expected someone to just email me and propose to do a figuring together when actually that didn't happen so I kind of had to create my own opportunity for this and and and and just go for it and see if it would work.

10:29And so that led me to do quite a few collaborations with nikola estrada who's this amazing 3d designers in italy and then I ended up doing a batch of figurines that were produced in in the uk and and it's just you know it's just having the sort of confidence of thinking well you know I've never done it before. And I don't think someone's going to hire me if they haven't seen it because we're in such a visual industry where it's hard to imagine something being translated into something completely different and having something in volume looks very different than obviously flat on a on a screen so it's just you know doing collaborations and and and just going for it and seeing if it works it is down a lot to personal work and you know I know.

11:13That's the main advice that every artist and creative give is to work on personal work to to make sure you're going in the right direction with with the projects that you get but it does really help and because when it's your personal work you have no feedback you have no client and you know you're just completely free to do anything that you want and it's bound to be a good reason to make your best work so so yeah. So that was sort of the the the conclusion I guess is to say that if you're you know if you're working and you're not doing exactly what you want that's completely fine you should really just keep the the lead on because at the end of the day it's your work.

11:50And it's your you know it's your passion. And it's your art and and you know you should just make sure that you're trying to do something that you're proud of and that you're happy to do and if you're not you can just steer yourself in the right direction and yeah that's all thanks so much molly that was amazing and such good advice in there for any kind of freelance creative I think one thing that really struck me from from what you were you're saying there is that I guess like as an illustrator particularly you really have to be your own kind of promoter and someone submitted a question before we before we came on today and the question is like how did you get the courage to start promoting yourself because it does take a bit of courage doesn't it yeah it's very hard and I think as most artists I think most of us are introverts so it's quite it's kind of challenging to then be like hey like look at what I do and and but I think you know.

12:42I think you just need to think that you're just promoting it you're putting it out there and the people who are gonna react most likely are gonna be it's gonna be a positive reaction and they're gonna be encouraging so don't be too scared about what people are going to say and and just as long as you're promoting something that you like there's no harm in doing that yeah fair enough I think that also answers a question that matteos had I hope I've said your name right sorry but it was yeah do you have any tips on creating online community around you and your work which I guess is the same thing it's kind of like yeah get it out there and hopefully I think yeah.

13:12I think I mean I did I I worked on a lot of personal work. And I you know. I really promoted that.

13:16And I had a lot of content because I kept creating series and so I could share them a lot and that really helped build a bit of a bit of a community and then other than that I think just just share your work and and and be happy with what you're sharing but there's not much else to say on that because yeah there's no kind of secret is there there's no secret natalie natalie had a really good question which is how did you go about pricing your work especially kind of as you started out how did you know how to value your output yeah that's really hard and I was not taught that at all by my school. And I had a lot of help from the aoi I have really like I sent a desperate email like let's just please help me. And I had the I had someone really helping me out on that. And then.

14:09I think you sort of have to I like to ask a lot of questions and I ask prices to other artists I know it's not really necessarily the so maybe it's because I'm french it's my rude side but I just think you know.

14:21And I like to reply to other people like if you don't know where people how people are pricing themselves it's going to be very hard to put yourself in the market so reach out to other artists and ask them maybe a lot will be uncomfortable answering but I think quite a few will help and I had some artists really helping me out on that as well. That's great yeah well good to get there's kind of a bit of community around that one final question from olivia she asks have you got any tips for balancing client work with personal projects I guess you talked a little bit about how important personal projects have been for you but how do you make that balance I guess well I mean to start with I I was just working I had I was working a lot on personal projects during my weekends and like evenings because I knew I had to focus on client projects and I had to get the money in and it's really hard at the start because you know you have to constantly be working to make a living but now I would say I think if you view the personal work as just I see it as something completely different like I'm having I'm having a lot of fun when I'm doing my personal series I don't even see it as work.

15:23So I'll have my work day where it's done all my clients work and at six in the evening I'll just start working on my own stuff and you know I would say that's I mean that's how I do it.

15:31But I know it means working a lot yeah unfortunately that's maybe