Lombi: Hey there and welcome to the interview. How are you today?
Anatheme: Thank you. I'm doing alright, except for this cough which is driving me crazy.

Lombi: Alright, let's start off with you giving us a little bit of background info ... who you are, what you do, where you are from, how old is your inner self, what your foot size is... that kind of thing :}
Anatheme: heh, my name is Antti Isosomppi, aka Anatheme. I'm 24 years old and I live in Finland, which isn't the capital of Sweden or populated with icebears and penguins. It's actually a country in the northern Europe.
Presently I'm serving the finnish defence forces, but I work as a freelance illustrator, I also make websites for companies when I'm really broke, lol

Lombi: How would you, in your own words, describe your style? What and who were your major influences in the development of that style? Does your soulmate have any bigger influences in what you do? Which artists do you admire and respect for what they do?
Anatheme: I would describe my style as dark and surreal. What I mean is that I don't find anything interesting in picturing everyday things, I prefer to picture things I feel inside of me. I don't believe I have produced a good piece from routine, I need a certain spark to make things click. That could be a great song or a certain feeling. My soulmate will keep me sane and also lets me know if I'm doing something that isn't me. I think comic books, such as spider man and some other Marvel comics were a huge influence when I was growing up. I liked Todd Mcfarlane's style very much although my friends hated him, cause they thought he doesn't know anything about human anatomy.
I remember also that I was fascinated by the movie Alien. And later H.R.
Giger also became one of my favorite artists. There are of course many people who's work I admire ... Dave McKean, Ashley Wood, Todd McFarlane, Michael Whelan, Boris Vallejo, Dennis Sibeijn, Jonathan Wayshak...

Lombi: What kind of music do you listen to, when you work? What are your favourite bands/artists?
Anatheme: That's a tough one...I listen to all kinds of bands when I work.
The latest record I bought was Perpetuum mobile by Einsturzende neubauten.
My favourite bands...I've always loved The cure, Godspeed you black emperor, dead can dance and Einsturzende neubauten...

Lombi: A question everyone wants to know these days ... at what point did you want to become the artist you are now ... was there any breaking points or such? How did you get started in digital art?
Anatheme: It was really late, only about 4 years ago, just before I applied for artcollege. I finally graduated last spring. I can only blame internet for getting in touch with digital art. I got my internet connection in 2002 and around then I was making my first attempts in digital art. I was really excited when I realized how to use the layers, lol.

Lombi: The second most commont question out there (hehe) ... what software do you use in creating your artworks, how does the common process look like when you are creating a piece? Do you just see that software as purely a tool used to create or as something more? What kinds of media and techniques do you commonly like to use when you create a piece?
Anatheme: I usually just use Photoshop 7 sometimes mixed with my scanned textures or drawings. Common process looks really, really different, cause it's always black and white and has no depth. I basically just throw in some stock images and fool around with them until I'm satisfied. Yeah, Indeed I see software as a tool...it doesn't differ entirely from other tools as brushes or pencils. When you paint you work layer by layer, it's a bit just like that when you're making digital art, lol. Apart from digital media I use almost everything I can get my hands on..maybe I like acrylics the most, cause they aren't so uncomfortable as oils. An ink bottle and a pencil are good for fast sketching.

Lombi: When you create a piece what normally inspires your work?
Anatheme: Usually it's the music I listen.

Lombi: When you are working on a piece, when do you know that it's finally done?
Anatheme: I guess one could go on forever with a piece, but I like to keep things fresh. I think I'm pretty impatient, I like to finish my works within a day, it's also done when I can't figure anything else but my name to put in there.

Lombi: Tell me how was it like breaking into the digital art scene ... i know it's very hard for young and unknown artists to get their name out nowdays ... how was your experience like? What's the best advice you could give to someone who wants to break into the scene?
Anatheme: Well...I started my career as a traditional artist and I'm now doing both digital and traditional art, so I don't think starting off something new like digital art was insuperable to me. I got more and more self-confidence from working my ass off. I wanted to develop my skills more than my style or substance of my works first. I wasn't really considered to get my name out there at first too, I think that it will follow if one works hard enough. My advice is that there are too many artists that are stuck in what they do the best and are maybe afraid to change anything in their art.
I suggest to avoid the familiar and safe formula. Always experience new things and search your limitations...I also think that someone who is starting out should approach someone really good in digital art and ask the person to teach some tricks. Never give up and work really hard. That's all...

Lombi: I've asked you to choose 5 of your favourite artworks to be featured here along with this interview ... so tell me ... why do you like these 5 so much, what are the stories behind them?
Anatheme: ok, I'll try. I'm usually really bad explaining my works.

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Cook off the meat: I just like the colours of this piece a lot. they are really untypical for me...also the way this was created is kinda cool. I didn't plan it or pre-sketch at all, I just started painting straight away. The other part of the painting was finished a week later. Came out looking pretty crooked, which is always nice, lol

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Cutting the edge: I've always liked to combine totally different elements together. This worked out really well. There's certain informative part in this, it's also so simple that it could be a poster, that for example needs to transfer something really alarming visually. It's pretty classic from me to combine organic and metallic parts together, maybe it's the Giger influence.

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AION: This is one of the strangest images I've made...I wanted to achieve a look of an ancient creature that came from a sea. I guess I like this cause it looks so very creepy...this started a more surreal season in my art.

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The ghosts of the future lost: This was a challenging one for some reason.
It was very hard to create the lightning. Again, metallic parts used with organic. I was thinking about a really bleak futuristic vision when I made this. Like always this didn't turn out the way I planned, but it's still one of my favourite works.

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The silence in me: This piece was made with my friend Cletus from Deviantart. This particular collaboration worked so well it surprised me, cause usually I don't do collabs. This work is about inner demons we all possess and rarely let out. If we do, something bad might happen.

Lombi: So tell me ... how would you describe the digital art scene roughly around your location? I've heard many artists complain about almost complete ignorance towards digital art ... especially from traditional artists, galleries and such. Your two cents?
Anatheme: I don't know any digital artists from where I live...and digital art is a fairly new form of art so prejudice isn't very uncommon. I had a display in my homecity about a year ago and I had both digital and traditional art displayed. I have to say that traditional art maybe got more attention. Of course if I would've had bigger prints the situation maybe would've been different. But overall the attitude towards my digital art have been positive and curious, it's funny to explain to some people over and over again how I make my pieces.

Lombi: What do you think about the whole online art community thing at the moment? Where would you like to see the future of art go? What are your plans for the future (except of course continuing to make such cool artworks)?
Anatheme: It's incredible. I enjoy meeting great artists with similar interests, the atmosphere has been overall very positive and encouraging in most of the galleries I've been visiting regularly. I've made great friends and had a great time...but the growt has been enormous during these couple of years I've been around. That makes it of course harder for newcomers. I can't deny that there are problems in all this...sadly some of the popular genres are monotonous mass that only repeats itself. hmm...Then there's rippers... If you want to display your art in internet there's always a chance that someone else will take advantage on your hard work. Future of art...I don't really give a fuck what is the trend, I just do what I do. So I don't know if I'm really that interested. I've seen really popular modern art and that didn't wake up anything in me. I would like to see people painting more, not just piling up some junk in corners.
But yeah, It would be nice to continue my work as long as I live and get paid for it...I've been thinking about how cool it would make record covers for bands that I like, so that could be my future plan, lol. Seriously, I want to buy an appartment where I could also have my studio. Now I don't have enough room to do what I like...that's why I've been concentrating on digital art so much lately. There's going to be a new exhibition too..maybe this year or the next, depends how productive the summer/fall will be.
That's going to be in Finland unless someone wants me to be somewhere else, lol.

Lombi: You have a website or anything?
Anatheme: Yeah, (http://koti.mbnet.fi/anatheme) but I haven't updated it in a long time. I'm planning to make a new site as soon as possible.

Lombi: You wake up one day and find out that you have amazingly cool superpowers. What are they?
Anatheme: I want to fly, absolutely. It would also be cool to be invisible ... I mean more invisible that I am now ha ha.

Lombi: Lol, try to put yourself on 50% opacity, mate. Second silly question ... you are able to own ANY piece of art in the world. Which one would you choose to hang on your wall?
Anatheme: If I would have a larger house I would choose The Spell II by H.R. Giger. I've seen it live, it's fantastic.

Lombi: You find out that you will be relocated on a desert island tomorrow. You can only take one thing with you. What is the one thing you can't live with?
Anatheme: hmm...I'm not very bond to material. Maybe I would drink myself to death with a bottle of absinthe ha ha.

Lombi: Hehe ... Err ... umm... any questions for me?
Anatheme: Your unhealthy habits?

Lombi: Ha, that's an easy one ^_^ ... I smoke like it was air, lol. I try quitting, but it's too good to just let go. Well, that's kinda the end of the interview. Thanks for taking the time, my friend. Any final words of wisdom you would like to share with us?
Anatheme: Thank you. I don't have anything else, this cleared everything. Take care buddy.