Eliza Williams on creating a community, applying for artist residencies and the value of relationships

Eliza Williams is a multi-disciplinary creative who specialises in illustration, animation and design, bringing a bit of colour into people’s lives. 

Her work takes on many different forms, combining both digital and traditional mediums to create a colourful little world to escape to and explore. 

In this episode, Eliza shares her journey as an illustrator, from going viral on Instagram to doing an art residency in Japan, her collaboration with Spotify, and why she thinks more creatives should be creating a community, not a following, on social media.

Welcome to the podcast, Eliza. I'm so excited that you are here. The people have just heard a little about what you are up to now, but I would love to learn a little about how you got here. I know that you started sharing your work back in 2017 when you did your communications design course, and then you started putting your work out a little bit more publicly in 2020, right?

So, is that when Doolittle Illustrations became official? Tell me about the origins of Doolittle Illustrations!

When I was in university, I studied design and one of the projects that I did there, we had to design post-EVS and had to be from Australian things, so I did Kath and Kim. That was one of the first times I started intertwining illustration into my design work and one of the first times I started to show my style.

Actually, the tutor that teaching me at the time, in front of the whole class told me that it was ugly. So that was an eye-opener for university and doing fine arts because after doing two fine arts classes, I learned that both of them were very set on doing things in a certain way.

Whereas with my design stuff, it was very experimental and most of my tutors were very on board with trying new things and open to everyone else's perspectives on design which helped me with my illustration, even until today. 

After that, I started doing illustrations on my laptop. I used to draw with my trackpad, which now I think is crazy that I did that. But I randomly decided to post on Instagram and a version of my earlier stuff has no lines at all. I did like a Snapchat filter for one of my best friend's sister's birthdays. I think that was my first-ever post and illustration commission.

Then I started doing these portraits and a bunch of my university friends and people in my circles asked me if I could start doing portraits for them for things like birthday presents, and that’s when I started to realise that maybe I could make this work.

Then lockdown happened and I had just finished my course, but wasn’t sure what to do anymore. I had no direction because I couldn't just go into an office and start working with other people.  So that's why I started to put the time and effort into my online presence.

From there, I started posting on TikTok where I worked with a variety of brands like Her Platform, and even artists such as Matilda Mann. Through doing some work for Matilda on Spotify, I got a DM from someone on there, which I thought was some sort of scam at the time, but it turns out it wasn’t. That’s how Spotify UK found out about me. And then I started that big “Our Generation” campaign with them, and then it just grew from there really!

Wow, that's amazing! I love that you decided to put more time and effort into your online presence and that’s what it all led to. So what happened when that all started happening and you decided, “Okay, this is a legit business. I’m ready to make this into a brand.” Tell me about that process…

When I first got started, I was learning on the job I didn't really know what I was doing. When I first got the Spotify work, I didn't even have an iPad or anything to draw with I was just using my computer and After Effects, which I'd only been introduced a few times to in my university course. I was just learning from people on YouTube and learning through other people how to do stuff like researching forums online.

At first, it started with just my illustration, but over time has grown to also me being involved as well. And then I just started to think about how I could brand myself and put myself out there to other people and other clients.

Yeah, that's amazing. I know you're not the only one who learns on the job because I remember I interviewed Ruby who went very quickly viral and had a similar situation. It happens all the time. People start with a passion and an idea and then have to figure it out along the way. That’s just so cool. 

I would love to talk a little bit about your visuals and your style now because you mentioned that your actual illustration style plays such a huge part in your brand. Your style is so unique and is actually what drew me to you. How have you found that you've discovered that style?

I've always drawn with line art. Even if I go back to drawings that I did when I was in primary school, I see elements of what I do now, which I think is crazy because I feel like there is so much pressure to have a style or to draw a certain way or be unique.

There are obvious influencers of artists that I follow and artists that inspire me. And I think that if you look at other artists' work and find like little things that you like about them and try and evolve that and make that your own and think about why you like other people's art and draw that in your, like your own style, I think that you're always going to eventually find some sort of style.

I find this question so hard to explain sometimes because I do get a lot of people asking, “How do I find my style? What do I do?” And it's I think probably the best way to start would be just by looking at your old drawings and things from when you were a kid and you didn’t care what people were doing and your only influence was your brain. Because I think that's where my style has evolved from.

That's such a good point because when we are children, there's no judgment, no self-critique, no comparing ourselves. We were just storing what inspired us, what we thought was interesting and what came from our brain. 

And so obviously people love your style you've been able to do some amazing things. Like we've mentioned a few times, the Spotify commissions, and you seem to have like an ongoing partnership with them or they keep coming back. So I’m curious… what have you found that has made them want to work with you and then make them want to keep coming back? 

When I started the Spotify stuff, there was a contract in place where they had plans for even five years in advance. (I’m not sure if it’s still like that now, but it was back then). I also continued working with the person who contacted me at Spotify after he finished working there and started his own agency. He was my agent at the time and although he’s not now, I am a huge advocate for having people in your corner, or at least connecting with people.

I know it can be very scary to reach out after you've done a project but it's always worthwhile because that's how you connect with people. And you don't know when a job is going to come up where they go, “Oh, I remember this person who did this. And I think that'd be good for this project!?”

I think a lot of illustrators when they start, expect that as soon as they get a project, they’re automatically going to be hired for more and more. When I'm contacted for a job, I'm always competing against other illustrators, and it doesn't always work out and rejection hurts. But I think it's a whole big part of the process. And I think rejection shouldn't stop you from doing what you want to do because you're always going to find different jobs eventually, and rejection is redirection.

For commercial work, it's good to have a set style o people know exactly what you do. You'll always have clients who try and change that, but most of the time, they'll want what you do. 

Man, there were so many good nuggets in there. Especially the “rejection is redirection.”

I have to remind myself all the time. There’s a cheesy saying that I always say to myself when jobs don't go through, because it hurts your soul a little bit. After all, art is your soul. I feel connected to my art. If it doesn't go through, or clients say the art isn't exactly how I wanted it to be, I find it hard to let that go, but it's just part of the process.

Great point! This week you are part of an exhibition which is so exciting! Congratulations on that. I feel like some artists are doing exhibitions or pursuing exhibitions, while some artists may not consider exhibitions as something think they can pursue. Tell me a little bit about your thoughts on why you wanted to be a part of an exhibition and how you found the experience. Have you done them before?

I have only just started to do exhibitions. One of my long-term goals is to have a solo exhibition but I think that for a long time because I was doing a lot of commercial work, that's where my head was at, and I thought that was my sole path.

But everything changed and the industry is very different even just since 2020 when I started actually getting work. You have to do so much more now which is why it’s important to diversify what you do. The exhibition work is more something that I like to do like personally, and it's like my own personal journey of things that I want to create, which I think you have to do as well because you can't just get stuck in your way with only doing commercial work. I think that it will lead to burnout very fast, which I've experienced. 

It's important to have your little things as well. For exhibition work, I try to be as experimental as I can with it all. For this exhibition, I have made clothes. I’m not a designer or anything. I just do it for fun. It's not perfect, it's more experimental, and it's something that I enjoy.

Exhibitions are also a great way to meet other artists, curators, and creatives. The exhibition I'm doing is with I Squared Gallery, and they're pretty new as far as I’m aware.

I think it's so cool. So is that something you had been looking for? How did you get involved in the exhibition? 

I originally followed them, but they reached out to me to be part of it. From my experience, you're usually the one reaching out to other people but it can also come back to you as well.

Incredible. If you are around in Melbourne and you want to go check out the gallery, you should go and do that. This episode will be out after the exhibition, but you should go and support the gallery and you should check it out anyway!

You have just done an art residency in Japan. I want to go to Japan so bad. Also, I just love the idea of an artist residency. I think that's so cool. One of my dreams as a business is to sponsor or pay for people's artist's residencies. Because I just think that's just to be able to allow people to do that is incredible.

So tell me about that. I feel like the people listening will be like, “I want to do that. How can I do that?!” So what, just give me all the details on how that happened. What is it? How did it come about? Tell us!

I love that that’s one of your dreams. That’s amazing. I think going on art residencies is something that I'd always wanted to do, but now that I've done one, I think it's so important for artists to do.

I found out about that residency through someone that I worked with on the Spotify event in London. I’d been looking at that residency with Studio Kira for a while – and I love telling people about them because it was honestly one of the most exciting and amazing experiences. The people who run it are amazing, kind, and wonderful and they deserve all the artists to go there.

So I’d been looking at it for a while and so had one of my artist friends, Beanie. Funnily enough, we both ended up getting in which is a very weird coincidence. It was really fun to do it with her, but also I think it would be an equally amazing experience to do it by yourself because you get to live with artists and do an exhibition with artists at the end of your residency. You get to meet people from all around the world. It's the best way to connect with people have a break from everything and solely focus on your art and what you want to do. 

I usually find out about residencies through Instagram. But there are probably certain websites where you can become a member – I'm not a part of this but you can become a member of certain websites that show you all the artist residencies that are available at that time. I think some are easier to get into than others and the one in Japan I paid for but there are others that like you don't have to. 

You just have to research a bunch, which is what I did. And every application is different too.

With the application, I assume you just have to pitch why you want to go and what you're going to do. Is that right?

Yeah. With artist residencies, they usually want you to explain what you're going to create at the art residency, and what your intention is with it.

With the one that I went on to there was a variety of people doing very different things. Some people were doing a whole series of work. And then other people were just doing one piece. There are also different time frames as well. So sometimes you can do a month, and sometimes two months, sometimes six months. It depends. 

You have to share your intention, share your artist statement, introduce yourself and show your work. Some are a bit harder to get into and are more probably fine arts-based.

“As long as you're pitching a good idea it's worth doing.”

Thank you so much for sharing about the residency. I just think it's so fascinating and there will be so many people listening who will have either thought about this, but thought, I could never do that or have never thought about it ever, or, just, I think it's so interesting to hear from somebody who's done it and has said do it. 

It was amazing to see and be able to follow it on social media, which I have some questions about. You have an incredible following on social media. Over 50,000 followers on both Instagram and TikTok. So well done on that! I would love to know – what do you think has worked well for you when it comes to building your audience and engaging your audience on either or both of those platforms or just on social media in general?

The long answer is that it's changed over time from what I thought worked for me before and what works for me now. When I first started, it was very different. But one thing I still think consistently works for me, is hashtags. In my experience, hashtags work. I think there's a certain sweet spot in doing them. And there's been times when I've done too many and there's been times when I've done too little. Sometimes my work will do well without anything at all. And I think it's good to do a mix of both of their hashtags and hashtags.

Right now I think reels do well. When I first started off doing reels, I had a very distinct style of what I wanted to do and I didn't want to go outside of that. I didn't want to do trends and that worked well for me. I just started posting my TikTok's on Instagram as well and used small artist songs because I wanted to push small artists' music out there. That helped at the time, but now I think it's more a mix of doing things that are trending.

Also having your own thing that people come back to helps. I think that's important because a lot of people will only do like the trending sounds and only do the trending things. But I think it's really important to make it your own and have your own specific thing that you do.

Connecting with your audience too. My main focus originally was to get a high number of followers, which is helpful, but I think now it's more about building a community rather than having a high number.

When I started out doing reels, one of them randomly went insanely viral. I don't know why. It was probably one of my, like worst content that I've ever made but it got 45 million views. However, it ended up on the wrong side of Instagram, my account got taken down and luckily, I got it back. But that is when I learned the importance of community over numbers.

I still see people who followed me back when I first started and we still comment on each other's stuff and are connected in some way. So, to me, I think that's more important than the number at the end of everything. 

“It's great to have a big number up there [on your Instagram], but I think if you want people to find your work, to connect with people and to have people want to buy your work and be involved with you, that it's more important to focus on that first and then the rest will come.”

Yeah, exactly. Especially because at the end of the day we are trying to run a business and we have to pay our bills and rent and all that sort of stuff. Having a big amount of followers doesn't necessarily convert to those things. You want people who are going to support you, whether that's by partnering with you, buying your products or sending your products to someone else or whatever. 

The follower count doesn't mean anything unless they're the people who are going to support you.

So I just want to ask you the one last question that I always ask everybody – What is either the number one lesson that you've learned about branding your passion or your number one piece of advice that you would give to other creatives who want to brand their passion? 

"My number one piece of advice for people would be, as cheesy as it sounds... Be yourself and put the work out that you want to put out and then people will come and people connect with that. As long as you're being yourself and being consistent, that's all that matters. Just be you."

The perfect piece of advice. I love it! Okay, thank you so much. This has been so incredibly insightful and I have had a great time learning more about you and about your work. I feel like I could talk to you for many more hours. I appreciate you so much.

Do you want to tell people what you have going on and where they can find you? I know you have some exciting things coming up…

Yeah, so I am on everything as @doolittleillustrations except TikTok, I'm @lizadoolittle over there!

You can come see my work if you want to. I do stupid little illustrations that are fun and hopefully brighten your day. And then, hopefully, I'll have merch and prints soon. That's something that I always say, and never do. We shall see. But that is my plan for this month. Keep an eye out for that. 

Oh, and I’m also doing a creative prompts challenge next month that I'm excited about and will be releasing soon!

Okay, incredible. Thank you so much, Eliza. I have had a blast and I'm sure everybody listening will have learned so, so much from you!

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