Gerrit Rijken

Illustrator/Logo Designer

Bergen, Norway
It is Gerrit "Tundra Toucan" Rijken, yet another underground illustrator and logo designer. That's right, the type that mostly works with metal bands that you probably never heard of.

Taking a graphical approach to logo design, I create sophisticated hand-drawn logos that are rich in expressive composition and sometimes eerie texture.

When not working on a commission, I'm probably designing unique characters for comics.

Work Experience

Self-Employed

Illustrator/Logo Designer

It is Gerrit "Tundra Toucan" Rijken, yet another underground illustrator and logo designer. That's right, the type that mostly works with metal bands that you probably never heard of.
December 2003 - Present Bergen, Norway

Delta

Editorial Cartoonist

For a year, I served as a recurring cartoonist for a university newspaper with a circulation of 8,000.
February 2011 - February 2012 Delft, Netherlands

Education

Erasmus University Of Rotterdam

B.A. in History

September 2002 - October 2007 Rotterdam, Netherlands

Languages

English (Fluent),
Dutch (Native),
Norwegian (Conversational),

Skills

Adobe Photoshop, Blender, Cartooning , Characterdesign, CLIP STUDIO PAINT, Letterart, Logodesign, Storyboarding, Typography,

My First Foray Into Science

I co-authored 'Illegible Semantics: Exploring the Design Space of Metal Logos', a paper about the "language" of unreadable metal band logos.

It was submitted to and accepted by the alt.VIS workshop at IEEE VIS 2021, the premier forum for Visualization research and technology.

On Sunday October the 24th, it was presented to the Visualization community.

Clients Old and New

Here are some of the bands I've worked with (in alphabetic order): Dauthuz, Funeral Void, Ghostheart Nebula, Intero, Psalmtanic, and Vathr.