Hello everyone. ☺️ This is not self promotion, I want to have some open creative discussion with you. So: I’m a book author, specialized in search and find illustrations (like Where’s Waldo books). Some of you may know my work from the Unofficial Search and Find Biographies book about Taylor Swift, which I published last year. As a search and find author, I love discovering easter eggs and studying the subjects I’m illustrating very deeply. And even though I already knew some stuff from BTS, I must say I have been going through one of the most challenging times in my life by studying their career for my new illustrated biography!
I always enjoyed Boy with Luv song. When I started researching, as a hip hop fan, I decided to begin with Skool trilogy albums. I was deeply impacted by it, and felt sorry for not being able to listen to BTS when I was going through lots of doubts, fear and rebel thoughts about my future during all university time (I got my degree years before BTS debuted. I went to advertising school, but was afraid of losing my life in corporative buildings and not being able to become an illustrator… fortunately, I was able to overcome these fears somehow). Also: When I started going through the side stories and concepts of Wings, Map of Soul and other albums I actually had to face very sensitive content about my past, relationship with friends and family, etc. I even brought these subjects to my therapy lol. Seriously, I never expected these artists would have such an impact on me.
So, I’m in the very last moments of finishing this book. In some weeks it will be done and sent to print. I’ve added lots of funny content related to their lyrics, life moments, their bomb videos, reality shows, documentaries… facts from their official biography, funny moments like trainees cheating Jung Kook about buying bingsu for all residence members, and serious stuff like the impact of fame on their personal identities. I’m actually overwhelmed with all this amount of information, but also proud of being able to catch all this in a vivid book that represents their career through my own visual perspective. If you are good with it, I would like to share a bit with you about my book and also ask to you, the fans, which I came up to understand are a fundamental stone in BTS history: what specific thing from their career, from your favorite album, from your favorite member, you think should NOT be missing in a book about them? Anything remarkable you would love to see, something memorable you saw in a specific concert years ago; I would love to consider making some visual reference for it in my book!
thanks so much for your patience reading this! Above is an image (actually, just a small crop) for my illustration representing their pre-debut time, when they were just arriving and meeting each other in Seoul! The Seoul taxi drivers, the Simsa station, the manwa bangs, dance hagwons, the chicken breast juices, the early RM hip hop lessons to the members… all is there, and much more ☺️ can’t wait for you to see it.