Let the drawings do the talking…

If you haven’t heard of Esra Gülmen, who focuses on human psychology and everyday problems while producing her work, you’re missing out on a lot. Esra Gülmen’s design adventure, which brilliantly blends typography with illustration and even uses typography as illustration, dates back to Frankfurt.

Esra, who got into the world of advertising 8 years ago in Ogilvy Frankfurt, is actually an interior designer. “I didn’t know exactly what graphic design was before getting into the Faculty of Fine Arts. Do you know the statistical charts and stuff like that? Yeah, for me, that was graphic design.” Esra, who tried to convince her parents by choosing interior architecture because her family didn’t approve the Faculty of Fine Arts, eventually found herself in the Department of Interior Architecture at the Marmara Faculty of Fine Arts and this school, which was based on the Bauhaus Ecole, introduced her to graphic design. “After graduation, I worked as an academic at the school for a few years and during that time, I was constantly illustrating.  At the time, one of my works was featured on the Lürzer’s Archive 200 Best Illustrators Worldwide.” Esra understood that she did not want to do interior architecture in the future.   

For Esra, who usually draws when she’s upset with something, her work is like a personal therapy. “While design tends to have a problem-solving purpose, art has not. I like to incorporate art into this problem-solving process through humor” says Esra while talking about the most exciting aspect of combining art and design. She wants to make people laugh a bit while solving problems, touch their brains and hearts.

When words are often incapable of expressing our feelings, letting the drawings do the talking is the best solution. To better understand the inner world of Esra, whose biggest dream is to draw a cover for the New Yorker, let’s have a chat with her drawings. 

How are you feeling these days?

How would you define inspiration?

Which city would you like to be in right now?

Any advice for the creatives?

Analog or digital?

Take us back to your childhood!