In this post you’ll find several drawings from Harald Siepermann’s 1985 sketchbook. At that time Harald was in his early twenties and studying Graphic Design at the Folkwang University in Essen, Germany. Searching for content to draw, he turned to popular German songs, and turned the lyrics into cartoonish characters.
“I had developed the habit to listen a lot to German chansons, what we call Liedermacher over here, probably because they were telling little 3 act stories in their songs, sometimes silly sometimes full of pathos,” commented Harald Siepermann. “I was using their lyrics as a source of inspiration, I was kinda listening for cues, illustrating their songs or people from them. I was, without thinking, doing little character design studies. This again ‘just happened’, I never thought about it as a concept, I was just desperately looking for things to draw, and I always preferred stuff from my imagination rather than drawing existing people, mimicking styles or doing landscapes.”
