Hey Everyone,
With all the discussion about the Art Academy cards, here is a Q&A @funmonkey54 conducted with two of the winners for anyone who is interested.
The first interview was with the the Chef Pikachu winner:
Q: Name:
A: Amelia
Q: Location:
A: England
Q: First, how did you find out about the competition?
A: I saw that is was being held in North America and was sad it wasn’t Europe, a few weeks later someone notified me that there was one here now, so I got to drawing 
Q: What led you to dress up Pikachu in this way?
A: I’d actually dressed him as a police officer, but I scrapped that as I was confused about the rules that said it had to be our own creation. So I added a table of poke puffs and changed his outfit I still have the police version though.
Q: If Pikachu baked those sweets for you, would you eat them?
A: heck yes! Poke puffs by THEE mascot???
Q: What is your history with the Pokemon franchise?
A: I’m 22, so I grew up with Pokemon, watched the anime, collected marbles, cards, tomy figures and loads more. I remember going into Dixons and buying a game boy colour (the purple see through one) and Pokemon yellow. That was and still is a big deal and fond memory to me. But recently I’ve began collecting the cards again (never stopped playing the games) and now own about 12 complete sets and various other rarer cards!
Q: What are your plans for the 100 copies? I know some winners were considering chewing them up and making a Papier-mâché volcano.
A: Sell some, keep some. The cards are really important to me. I still can’t believe something that I drew is on an actual Pokemon card! Little me would be proud!
Just want to that me everyone for the support shown towards my cards, it really means a lot to me that people like it.
The 2nd interview, with the Tangrowth Winner:
Q: Name:
A: GoshaDole, or a link to my Facebook page
www.facebook.com/radiogosha
I also have some Pokemon themed shirt designs:
radiogosha.storenvy.com/collections/1160997-pokemon
Q: Location:
A: Washington, USA
Q: First, how did you find out about the competition?
A: I’m actually a competitive TCG player in the Pacific Northwest here in the US, so I probably noticed it on one of the Facebook groups I belong to, or saw it on Pokebeach.
Q: You picked a Pokemon no one else picked. What drew you to Tangrowth (Pun intended)?
A: Hah, I always liked the slam-dunk look of Tangrowth. It looks like hes shooting a free throw with those giant arms. My friends and I like to call it “Slam-dunkula” along with Alakajam, the basketball playing Alakazam, which was another idea I was thinking about doing. I also was looking for something I knew could pop using the limited capabilities of the 3DS Art Academy software. My favorite Pokemon (don’t tell anyone!) is actually Nosepass, but I figured it would be as interesting to base a design off of.
Q; You have a very unique style. What has influenced your style of art over time?
A: My passion has always revolved around minimalism. I do a lot of vector-based illustration and limited palette designs. I think some of this stems from being a fan of early Japanese video game artwork and packaging, in addition to pop art. I’ve never really been into photo-realism, and I think if you can make an impactful design by limiting yourself, it means a lot.
Q: If you could change one thing about your artwork, in retrospect, what would that be?
A: I’m a little sad that part of the Tangela got cut off in the final print. It was hard to know how it would turn out on the final card, so if I could have moved them down a tad, I would have loved to have been able to do that. Otherwise, I love how it turned out~! You only have two layers to work with in the software, which makes things quite difficult to change as well.
Q: Are you a fan of the Pokemon franchise?
A: Yes! I have been an on and off again fan since it began in 96-97. I’ve always been more of a fan of the tcg and video games than the anime and have been able to keep up with all the new Pokemon that have been introduced throughout the years.
Q: What about Pokemon can you most connect with?
A: Being a professional designer myself, I love the diversity in the designs of all of the monsters. Some people complain about Pokemon just being trash bags or ice cream cones… but at least they are well-designed and interesting, hah. I like to let this surround me and influence some projects that I work on. I also really enjoy the generational aspect of the series. Its been around now for so long, you have both young and adult fans. I believe the game is always a great way to teach kids about resource management, mathematics, critical thinking, and a list of other things.
Q: Have anything special planned for your 100 copies? Friends, family, ceremonial burning?
A: I already burned 99 of them and threw the last one on ebay for 10k if that answers that, hah. JK. Right now I have been giving out a few to close friends and family. After this, I have been arranging contacts to trade with the other winners. Once I’m able to finish as many trades as I can, I plan on selling some publicly. I haven’t figured out how I’ll approach this yet, but if I do it will probably be later in the year. I plan on keeping a chunk for myself in the long run as well. I’d like to get these distributed to many collectors instead of just a select few, so they can be appreciated instead of just being stored away somewhere.
Thanks again for letting me do this Q/A. It was still quite a surprise to win this contest. I have been a huge Pokemon fan for years. This was certainly a dream come true for me.
