Meet Klemen Vodopivec | Illustrator & Designer

We had the good fortune of connecting with Klemen Vodopivec and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Klemen, can you walk us through the thought-process of starting your business?
Well, the start of my business happened very spontaneously. I was in the final year of college and came to an idea to show some of the illustrations on Instagram. I thought, maybe somebody will find them interesting enough to want one for themselves.

I was playing basketball growing up so basketball and hip-hop influenced me heavily growing up so I started posting basketball and hip-hop illustrations.

Surprisingly, after a few months into this process, I got a few DMs from European basketball teams and their players wanting me to make them custom illustrations.

This then led to a collaboration with the basketball club Prienai which signed the two Ball brothers (LiAngelo and Lamelo Ball) and STN Digital, a Social Media Marketing Agency from San Diego, with which I worked on projects for the NFL, New England Patriots, Green Bay Packers, All Elite Wrestling and others.

Can you open up a bit about your work and career? We’re big fans and we’d love for our community to learn more about your work.
Well, I love to make cartoon illustrations. This is a style I developed and felt most comfortable when starting to draw with Adobe Illustrator. I think everyone has his/her own style of drawing/illustrating so that’s one thing that sets us apart from each other.

I think that starting to draw and showing my work led me to get in touch with people I never dreamed of talking to. So that is a great honor. Also, I need to mention that illustrating is, for now, some kind of a side job or a passion project, so all the references and experiences helped me to get new clients and a job as a Graphic Designer at the Basketball Federation of Slovenia where I work to this day.

It wasn’t always easy. I got my first real illustrating job when I and my girlfriend were in Berlin on an internship. So when we came back home to Slovenia I started working at the Basketball Federation. The problem was we didn’t found any apartments to stay in Ljubljana so we had to drive every day for 2 hours to work and back. I know that is not a long drive by American standards, but in Slovenia, this is considered a long drive haha.

I remember waking up at 6 am, picking up my girlfriend, driving to Ljubljana in an old Hyundai Accent, worth probably 300 €, where we worked till 4 pm, then driving back home. I got home at 6 pm, ate something, and got to illustrating until 1 pm, go to sleep for 5 hours, wake up at 6 and repeat the same things as yesterday. I also have a little brother who was 5 at that time so after a few days of juggling all that was exhausting.

The whole thing can be challenging, especially as a freelancer. You can have a lot of projects one month and zero projects the next. The journey is full of ups and downs, but I would like to finish with a quote from Tupac Shakur: »Through every dark night, there’s a bright day after that, So no matter how hard it gets, stick your chest out, Keep your head up, and handle it.«

Any places to eat or things to do that you can share with our readers? If they have a friend visiting town, what are some spots they could take them to?
To be honest, Slovenia is so small that you can go from Triglav (the highest mountain in Slovenia) to the Slovenian coast in less than 2 hours haha. You can treat the whole country as a City. A few places I would recommend are for sure the Ljubljana City Center, Ljubljana Castle, Bled, Logarska dolina and Piran.

If someone happens to find themselves in Slovenia feel free to hit me up and hang out. 🙂

Who else deserves some credit and recognition?
As mentioned in the first question, I was heavily influenced by basketball and hip-hop culture growing up. One person that was a role model growing up was Allen Iverson. He was the first person who I felt alike, because he was different from everything we saw in that era.

Growing up I knew I don’t want a boring office job and wanted to do something different. I always liked to draw and play basketball, but my basketball dreams shattered when I got diagnosed with a heart condition at 10 years old. I had to stop all physical activities for a few years and in that time there was nothing else to do than to watch cartoons (anime) and draw.

When I was in college and wanted to find my place under the sun I came back to what I loved growing up – drawing. At that time I went to the Faculty of Natural Sciences and Engineering – Graphic and Interactive Communication in Ljubljana Slovenia, where I learned to use the Adobe Creative Suite. I combined my love for drawing with the Programmes I learned and started posting my illustrations on Instagram.

So if there’s something or someone who deserves a shoutout it has to be Allen Iverson, Dragon Ball Z, Pokemon, One Piece, and of course my girlfriend, now fiancee, Lucija for supporting and motivating me to stick to the process. 🙂

Website: https://www.behance.net/kvodopivec

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/keivo_studio/

Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/klemenvodopivec/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/klemen.vodopivec.9/

Image Credits
Tilen šoštarič, SOZ (Slovenian Chamber of Advertising)