WORK SHOWCASE: Christian Dellavedova

This week, the Directory of Illustration highlights work from Christian Dellavedova, represented by António Adrião Artist Representative (AAARep).

Illustrator: Christian Dellavedova

Client: Internazionale Magazine (Christmas Special Illustration)

Agent: AAA Rep

From the Artist: “Working with Internazionale, a magazine I have been collaborating continuously for about ten years now, always gives me the opportunity to illustrate interesting articles by authors from all over the world. One of my favourite moments during the year is the Christmas special issue assignment. This year issue was about noir stories from all over the world.

I was asked to illustrate a short story by the Nigerian architect and writer Pemi Aguda. The short story “Choir boy” was previously published in Lagos Noir, a collection of thirteen stories that stretch the boundaries of “noir” fiction, but each one of them fully captures the essence of noir.

In the story “Choir boy” a man laughs deliriously upon witnessing a bus robbery and a woman being molested. Why? Because he, too, was once molested and so succumbs to a kind of insane schadenfreude. I used a typical Nigerian animal, hyena ridens, as a metaphor for the ferocity the character faces in the story, symbolizing the strong impact of the events on the man’s mind who find himself blindly changed by a violent experience.”