#CAF26 Poster Q+A with Rhianna Berthoud

Rhianna Berthoud is the designer and animator of the poster for #CAF26. We wanted to spotlight the amazing art that Rhianna creates! We hope you love getting to know Rhianna as much as we did!

1. Can you tell us a bit about yourself and how you got into illustration and animation?

I am an Illustrator and Animator based in Cardiff!

I got into art and animation from a very young age, making clay animations with my Dad and always drawing and having fun experimenting. My life has since revolved around being creative and enjoying the process of making art. I love surreal characters and animals, and I have always enjoyed drawing them!

At university, I started illustrating posters and album covers for my musical friends, and from there, I rediscovered animation through making music videos and experimenting with animation. The first music video I created was for a close friend of mine, Connor Childs, for his music project ‘Mothman, The Man’, and since then, I became enamoured with animation.

2. This year's festival theme is ‘Play’, how did you feel about the challenge of depicting this theme on the poster?

I absolutely love the theme play, and it aligns so well with how I approach my own projects! I enjoy games in all forms, from inventing fun games with my family and friends to playing with mixed media in my work. 

The main challenge of depicting the theme on the poster was creating a lively scene. I wanted all the characters to feel alive, and I enjoyed fitting as many fun elements as I could into the poster to make it busy and playful.

3. Lots of your work includes fun, cute, playful creatures, are these your favourite things to draw?

These are definitely my favourite things to draw. Animals are a recurring theme in my work because I find them endlessly inspiring! There is so much inspiration to find in nature, so I always make a point of drawing outside to surround myself with it. I love to create my own animals and characters from my imagination as well, and see how many different types of media I can create them in.

4. We love the tiny models incorporated into this year’s poster! Especially mini Dotty! What do you enjoy about sculpting and model making?

I had such a great time making the models for the poster, and I took the direction of combining clay and drawings. 

I love to combine 2D and 3D together because the work becomes playful and more visually interesting. The little characters are made from polymer clay, and I drew the other creatures with ink. Marbling the colours together to create strange patterns is endlessly fun, and I love how tactile and intuitive it is to work with clay. Nothing beats the real deal and working with your hands!

5. Are you excited to see the poster come to life?

I’m so excited to animate the poster. Characters come to life through animation, and I find that animating a character helps with building its personality. Seeing them move gives them so much charm and magic.

6. What were your favourite animated films growing up?

I watched a lot of funky animated films and TV shows growing up, including Old Bear, Pingu and Wallace & Gromit and the Curse of the Were-Rabbit. I also loved the scenes in Mary Poppins where the characters enter the chalk drawing, and there is a mix of live action and animation.

Since then, Adventure Time has been an enduring love since my early teens. Their approach to animation and storytelling is endlessly inspiring to me, and I love how the characters are written with a lot of silliness, combined with a strong depth of character. 

7. The theme of ‘Play’ touches on games of all varieties, do you have any particular favourite board games/video games/party games?

I have so many favourites! My favourite board game at the moment is Tokaido - a game where you gather items and experiences as you travel along a river footpath. I also love classic games like cards and chess.

I grew up playing a myriad of video games. Super Mario Galaxy and Rabbids Go Home come to mind because they are so playful and all about interacting with the world around them. 

My current favourite video game is Hylics! Hylics is made by Mason Lindroth, and he creates such amazing surreal worlds that are artistic, full on, and absolutely brilliant.

As for party games, I just created a mini Zine full of made-up games with my friend Tom Carter, and it has some of my favourite silly games, card games and a board game inside!

8. Where can we see more of your work?

I share all of my Illustrations and Animations on my Instagram and Website. I also publish my animations on YouTube and TikTok, and you can catch me at lots of Illustration Fairs too, including Arthole Cardiff, Shake Bristol and Brighton Illustration Fair!

Instagram - instagram.com/rhiannaberthoud

Portfolio Website - rhiannaberthoud.com

Linktree - linktr.ee/RhiannaBerthoud