Ryan Heshka’s illustrations are very much inspired by vintage comics. His love of old comics, pulps, and film, is filtered through a wider range of sources and inspiration, with the result being very distinctive.
Based in Canada with his wife Marinda and cat Louis, Heshka’s love for creating was fueled by the long prairie winters in Winnipeg. To entertain himself, he would spend most of his childhood drawing, building cardboard cities, and making super 8 films.
As he grew up, he trained in interior design, but with a passion for illustration he found himself looking for a different creative route. “I have always drawn and created, and when I left interior design, I got the illustration bug,” he told Flaunt. “However, it took me about seven years to get my foot in the door.” In the interim, he worked in animation doing character clean up and layouts. Today, he says, his interior design experience still plays a big role in his art in terms of special awareness and color usage.
With features in publications like Vanity Fair, Wall Street Journal, Esquire, and the New York Times, he’s clearly doing something right! Follow his original work on Instagram:
