Meet the Artist: Andreea Dumuta - Pt. 1
Q1: Trick or Treat?
Hmmm...tough choice. I’ll choose Trick this time.
Q2: Last minute invite to a Halloween party - what’s your costume choice?
Mia Goth is my new favorite scream queen. I absolutely loved her as Pearl so I’d go with that look. Also it’s basically just a red dress and some hair accessories so perfect for a last minute Halloween party. Can’t go wrong with such a look.
Q3: We know Halloween is your cup of tea - so how did it feel creating a Halloween-themed deck for Flick Solitaire?
Oh, not just Halloween. I love everything horror related. I had a blast designing these. It was right down my alley. Also, I’ve been playing Solitaire casually ever since I’ve gotten my first computer when I was a kid, and being able to design my own deck for it was pretty fantastic.
Q4: Which is your favourite suit from your Vampyr Deck and why? (So hard to choose!).
I really like the QD card, the one with the vampire skull and rose. I’m pretty proud of that
Design. I like how I drew the rose. And it’s quite fitting with the vampire imagery I have going on. Quite gothic I’d say.
Q5: We love that some of your card art illustrations are inspired by songs - especially The Smashing Pumpkins - please tell us more about the inspirations behind your Vampyr Deck.
Thank you so much. The Smashing Pumpkins illustration was reverse engineered to be a Smashing Pumpkins illustration. I drew the skull first for the deck but it was too detailed to be a part of the game, so I wanted to turn it into an illustration and the first lines of the song kept playing in my head so I just went with it.
My source of inspiration for the deck and in general is mainly tattoo art and retro illustrations. I absolutely love that analog, old school vibe. But I try to keep it fresh with some bold color choices or with some modern compositions.
Q6: Do you play card games? Which one is your favourite?
Oh yea, like I’ve mentioned in a previous question, I’ve been playing Solitaire casually ever since I was a kid. I find it quite relaxing. I used to play some card games in real life as well, but I can’t recall the name of the game.
Q7: Who is your favourite Flick artist and why?
You managed to bring together a pretty amazing line up. So difficult to choose from!
Hmm...I’m gonna tell you a few. In no particular order:
Rex Crowle. I was instantly drawn to his deck while playing the game. I bought it and now I’m playing to collect all the cards. Gorgeous color schemes and beautiful character design. Fantastic work.
Naoshi. Another deck that instantly caught my attention. Right down my alley color scheme wise. And the artstyle is so unique and amazing. I totally love it.
Rain Demitree. I love the bold style and of course, the spooky vibes! Such a great deck. Love the colors, the textures. Amazing artworks.
Q8: You’re known as Galactixy Illustrations - what is the idea behind that?
Haha, you won’t believe this, but I wanted to use Galactica as a username when I made my IG account back in the days, but it wasn’t available, so I kept changing the last few letters and it ended up like this. Surprisingly it stuck, so now I keep using it on all my platforms.
Q9: Our players love to learn about our Flick artists so please tell us more about yourself, and your background as an artist.
Well, to make a pretty long story as short as I can. I live in Romania, in one of the biggest city in this country called Timisoara. I’m 26 years old. Will turn 27 in March. Been working as an artist professionally for almost 4 years now, but I’ve only started taking steps toward an art career when I was 18, and in my final highschool year. I’ve never thought as art as a viable career and truthfully although I did show some interest in drawing as a child, I wasn’t particularly invested in it. My plan was to follow a Computer Science career and went to a highschool whose profile was focused on that. But as I picked drawing as a hobby I just fell in love and totally changed my plans.
So I trained hard to learn how catch up on the basics of drawing, to be able to go to the art university. That plan was a success but I ended up hating art school. I studied traditional drawing. My teachers hated my drawings and I hated attending classes so basically I was left in spot where my future was quite unclear. But after I finished my studies I actually started learning drawing digitally and felt like I found my place. The rest is history haha.
Q10: How did you get started in this deliciously dark and hip art style?
I used to be like this emo angsty teenager who watched one too many horror movies and read a ton of Stephen King books and listened to a lot of gloomy and angsty emo music, so it’s basically in my DNA to have this inclination towards dark imagery. But funny enough, I also have a pretty bubbly side to my personality. I love color, I love modern illustrations and how much they pop and catch the eye so I thought why not have the best of both worlds? I think that’s how my style was born.
Q11: What inspires your artwork?
Art of all kinds, nature, life. I love music, movies, spooky stuff. I get inspired by a lot of things.
Q12: Are there any specific themes or subjects that you are passionate about?
Oh, I do have a lot of things that interests me. Besides the arts, I do love history a lot. Also politics. But I have guilty pleasures like internet drama as well. Working from home I get to watch a lot of Youtube while drawing. So I’m always tuned to the latest online gossip.
Q13: Female artists have historically been underrepresented in the art world - have you seen things improve and what can we do better to reduce gender disparities in the arts?
I think it depends on the area of art. In my field of art, aka illustration, being that it’s basically a self owned business type of deal, where you don’t depend on art institutions to get by, I’ve seen plenty of female artists thriving, which is great. Where I’ve seen a discrepancy still, it’s gallery art. I went to art school, and things were pretty rigid there still.
