Forget “box of chocolates” – life is like a bowl of ramen; you never know what you’re gonna get out of that delicious, unbeatable broth! What’s not to love? Beto Petiches gets it. This artist’s winning design for our Food Challenge stirs together a love of typography and the delicious noodle dish in perfect harmony to create a design that even a non-ramen fan would dig.
We talked to Petiches about their favorite ramen, their work at a stop-motion animation studio, and about the winning design. Check out the interview below!
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Tell us a little about yourself! What do you do for a living? Where are you from? Favorite movie?
Hello, I’m Beto Petiches from Mexico City. I’m a freelance designer and an animator at Cinema Fantasma, a stop-motion focused film house. I also like to draw little jokes whenever I can. Of course some of my favorite movies are animated, but I have learned a lot about cinema history while working in Cinema Fantasma. I don’t think I can name only one, because movies are special in different ways. I really like Big Fish because it reminds me of my grandfather who, by the way, was the one who got me into drawing.
Congratulations on your first Threadless win AND first print! Excited?
Are you kidding me!? It is awesome! I always thought it was impossible haha. Every time I got a design on Threadless I told my friends that winning was kind of impossible; there are really great talents sharing awesome designs. So, yes. I’m really excited and thankful.
So I think it’s safe to assume you’re a Ramen fan? What’s your favorite kind?
Yes, I am. I’m fan of Japanese food (and Japanese anything, haha). I’m actually more of an Udon fan, but I thought people may be more likely to relate to Ramen. I don’t know if that’s true, but that’s what I thought when I decided to draw my design. I think I unconsciously drew it more like Udon, but it was more of an aesthetic decision to help the readability of the drawing. Anyway, I love using those awesome finger extensions they call chopsticks haha.
How did you come up with this design?
I simply just like both things. I love typography, I actually just finished a postgraduate study on that, and of course, I love Japanese food. So for me it made sense, haha. I thought it was a good way to mix those two.
On Behance you say that your art is inspired by “human nature and its accidents” – what everyday accidents and human occurrences most inspire you?
I’m really inspired by language, by words & wordplay. Context is what lets the words make sense, and by playing around with it you can come up with very interesting and fun results. So most of the time, those accidents in the understanding of words are what make me think of our human condition and the mistakes we go through, but in a fun way, you know? Nothing too deep.
That’s awesome. You have an Artist Shop with us too! How did you decide which
designs to put in it?
I put designs I wanted my friends to have. Some of them are type inspired, but
mainly they are doodles that I did in the past and that I like, so I wanted to share them, maybe someone else likes them as well.
What inspires your aesthetic? What artists and art styles are you inspired by?
I’m inspired by every artist I’ve seen, but the ones that I really like and try to follow are the ones that tend to draw without caring too much, with wiggly lines and broken strokes, and also I like very simple designs, just a couple of quick strokes and almost no color. You know? Those works that make people say “my kid could do that better.” And I think they could!
But what I like about those works is that there’s something really honest on those first intention lines. There are no regrets, just the artist’s feeling without filters. There’s something about those sketchy lines that makes me think of something really powerful and sincere. It’s so basic it is really direct. Just the expression without caring for anything else. Any way, haha, that’s what I think.
Anything else you want to share?
I want to thank Threadless, because this is awesome! I’m a big fan, and I’m really happy to have one of my designs as a winner.
And about sharing, yes! I always want to share what I draw haha. I don’t know if I should shamelessly promote, but I have a Threadless Artist Shop and an instagram, both as “petiches” I hope you like what you see there.
Thanks again, and woohoohooo!
