HatterpillarArts said art has been a part of her life since she can remember:
"I've been drawing since I was a toddler. My dad is an amazing artist, so I took after him and had my first tiny art studio under the stairs when I was about 4 years old."
We asked the artist where she draws inspiration for her art from.
"Inspiration for me can come from a lot of different sources at once. It can be something as random as the weather, or it can be a song lyric. It definitely changes a lot. Sometimes I do pieces where I can't pin down any kind of inspiration, and the art piece 'just kind of happened.'"
She added that she is inspired by the greatest artists like Salvador Dali, Andy Warhol, and Van Gogh. She also highlighted modern artists as a big influence—Australian YouTuber Jazza, who does a lot of cartoon-style art, and Jim McKenzie, who's an amazing sculpture artist.
HatterpillarArts says her favorite thing about Disney is the light-heartedness and positivity that brings you back to childhood.
"What I like about Disney is the fact that you can sit and watch a Disney film, and you and everyone you're watching it with can feel like a child again for those 2 hours. Bright colors, great art, and fun songs to sing along to. What more could you want?"
The artist shared the most rewarding and the most challenging parts of the Disney series: "The most rewarding thing about any series, but especially the Disney project, is the audience reaction. These pieces appeal to everyone, old or young, and there's always so much happiness surrounding them in the comments. There aren't many challenging things about it, but if I had to say something, I'd probably say the hours I put into the work. For example, Louis as Tiana (my latest addition) took me about 8 hours non-stop from start to finish. Definitely not as long as a lot of art pieces take, but it definitely took it out of me."
"There's like a 90/10 reaction of people loving and hating the series," HatterpillarArts told us about how people are receiving the series online. "90% of people think it's absolutely adorable, funny, entertaining, and original, and the other 10% make it very well known that they think it's cursed and ugly. It definitely means a lot to me, because I started posting my art online purely to try to brighten people's days, and the Disney project achieves that so well for both adults and children. That's all I care about."
HatterpillarArts says her drawing is a little bit all over the place as she likes to experiment with new styles: "My personal original style is realism. I do a lot of realistic portrait oil paintings and/or digital art. However, I do draw in a LOT of different other styles too. For example, the Disney project is very cartoon, and the Pokemon project, another popular ongoing long project I do, are purely calligrams (art made completely out of words). I like dabbling in all kinds of art, I don't like sticking to one style."
The artist already has a lot more planned for the Disney series and other artwork in the nearest future.
"Other characters I have planned are Merida (Brave), Megara (Hercules), Giselle (Enchanted), and Snow White. After I've run out of princesses, I will hopefully be doing the same kind of thing with princes and villains because I think that'll be super fun. My future art will also consist of a lot more of my other ongoing project, the Pokemon project, and also I would really love to be posting more of my original work in the next year or so. Hopefully, people like it!"
Besides running her art Instagram account, HatterpillarArts is also a Twitch streamer where she plays video games live and does insightful art streams with original artwork, including new illustrations for Disney and Pokemon series.
