How I got STarted

Hi, I’m Freddie, the mind behind 993 Art & Illustration. I started this blog to give people a bit of a look behind the scenes, how the artwork comes together, what inspires it, and the thought processes behind each piece. I figured the best place to start was right at the beginning: how I got into illustration, and how I ended up designing for bands… so here you go.

This all started for me back in 2021, when I was 17 years old. I already had a huge interest in art, I’d been drawing for years and took it as one of my GCSEs in high school, but at that point, I wasn’t really thinking about it as a career. Drawing was just something I loved. It was my escape, my happy place. I could sit down for a couple of hours, lose myself in a piece, and let everything else fade into the background. That feeling has always been my reason for being creative, and the reason I’ve always wanted to keep art in my life.

I’d also entered a few online art competitions, though I never managed to win any. One that still sticks in my memory was when I painted a really intricate astronaut scene, only to have it beaten by a line and a circle on a yellow background. That one was definitely hard to take. It was discouraging to see something I’d put so much work into be passed over for something that felt so simple. At the time, I just couldn’t understand the judges’ thought process, or grasp the massive amount of subjectivity in the art world. I remember thinking Surely art is either objectively good or bad? So why was mine seen as the latter?

I suppose any rejection will always be a tough pill to swallow, especially at a young age but I didn’t let it stop me. I kept entering, hoping that something would eventually land.

Then eventually came the competition that changed everything…

But I’ll save the rest of this story for next time.