Background
I’m 27 years old and live in Paris, France. My first implications in the visual culture started when I was around 16 or 17. Back in the days, I was living in a small and boring city in the South West of France, spending most of my time doing graffiti with one of my friend called “Mant”. We had a crew called Middle Classes and were basically trying to fight against all the big clichés that could exist in the movement, by painting in a definitely new school vibe. We were influenced by that 3D scene from Germany and Switzerland represented by people like Daim, Loomit, or Delta. In a certain sense, I guess I hated graffiti more than I loved it, and I was more attracted by the typographical researches than by B-boy characters and all those shitty “wild style” letters. I never bought graffiti magazines and found more inspiration in graphic design books. So, after some years it becomes really natural for me to try to explore the computer possibilities, as an extension of what I did on the walls. So, I started to learn by myself month after month how to use the applications. And something like one year later, I met another graphic designer named “Delarocca“. Our lives were pretty different but we share a lot of influences and sensibilities together. So, we start a graphic design crew called “Structure“. We did our first production. It was a fanzine “deluxe” simply called… “First“. We printed it in a silver ink on a black paper, with many interviews of people like Antipop Consortium or the Scratch Perverts. Both together we also did a graphic design book called “NYC Rules”, in an independent way too, dealing with the NYC’s underground cultures. During that period I worked on two different urban culture magazines, as a graphic designer and art director (Kink magazine and BPM magazine). Nowadays I mostly work as a freelance illustrator for record labels, magazines, wear brands, or stuff like that.

Mega and megahell
Since some years, I use to sign under the name of Mega for all my illustrations. It’s kind of ironic, like a “megalomaniac” attitude. According to my bad sense of humor, it’s funny cause it sounds really pretentious and at the same time it’s like an old school name. And you can put what you want after this name and it works! After, it just a question of which character you want to see behind the name. So, megahell is just something that I took for my website domain, cause my real name is Gaël. So, you know… Mega + Gaël = Megahell… But I think I should think about finding a better explanation. Like “You know man, I had a really hard education. I grew up in a catholic school, and one day the priest rape me in the toilets. So, nowadays I’m totally fucked up. I wanna take my revenge by drinking some chicken’s blood, buying some gothic clothes, and taking a part in some satanic movement, like the Megahell sect.”

Childhood
I blend hand illustrations, graffiti, vector & typography seamlessly in a very natural way. On my point of view, all those mix are totally natural cause there are just a expression of my different experiences and influences. I think I kept some habits from my graffiti period, like putting outerlines on the characters, or using most of the time shinny and simple colors. What I like to do on my illustrations, is to mix the characters drawn with really clear and clean lines, and a dirtier background, made by hand in a trasher style. The typography stuffs are a good way to bring another level in the pictures. You could put stupid words on a serious situation and make it kinkier.
So, I guess we are a whole generation who grew with a very strong and eclectic visual environment. As children we had the pixels and the flashy colors of our 8bits videogames. As teenagers, the graffiti, but the skateboard, the hip-hop, or the punk industries too, made big impressions on us. Today, everywhere you put your eyes, you see pictures, from ad-billboards to stickers, passing by clothing logos, website designs or simple tags. It seems to be exponential. But for me it’s not a problem. The huge difference with the other generations is that almost everybody can have a computer and start to mix all those subconscious influences. Design is everywhere and everybody could be a designer. Just do it!

Music
Music inspired me more than everything. From oldtime funky shit to underground hip-hop joints, I’m really into it. And for me, there is a similar approach in doing graphic stuff and music. In term of process and state of mind, illustrators and producers are like fraternal twins. Alone behind your computer, you have to work hours and hours to establish a structure, that you gonna complete by picking effects and samples in your personal bank. Then, years after years, productions after productions, you start to build your own style, with its own “color” that makes it identifiable. At this point, people and clients start to pay attention to your shit and think about asking you to feature in their projects.

Politic
The main political or social message of my work is: “Follow your own line”. It won’t be easy, but at the end you’ll got more satisfaction than anybody else. No matter if sometimes this line seems to be really kinky, you have to keep following it. Cause the secret is that it’s the only one to bring you to your destination. Try to follow the straight line imposed by the society and one day you’ll realized that you are going to your lost. I don’t mean you need to be antisocial or something like that. Just that you have to be social, but in the way you chose.
Politics is just a part of our daily lives. For me, it’s all a question of money. You can vote if you want to, but the only efficient way to change the world around you is to pay attention to the manner you are going to earn and spend your money. I don’t wanna hurt people by earning my cash, and that’s why I wanna stay freelance. “Nobody will get exploited by my work, including me.”

Nike
Clark magazine
Kink magazine
BPM magazine
WAD magazine
Max magazine
Technikart magazine
Tetu magazine
Palais de Tokyo
Cartel
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