Title of Paper:

• The Secret Species: Characters With Purpose

In every culture today you will find characters created to educate, persuade, entertain, and inspire us. For the last eight years I have created character-based artwork, graphic design, and illustration primarily using animals and fictional creatures as subject matter. In 2010, I set out to create my own characters that would allow me to play, experiment, and develop new fine art that would also inform and impact my skills as an illustrator, graphic designer, and activist promoting the arts. My goal was to create new character-based original works that would encourage others to realize the importance of their imaginations. For this project I created a set of one hundred characters made from sculpy clay called The Secret Species. These sculpted figures served as my models and muses for eight weeks as I created stories, paintings, drawings, comics, silk-screened packaging, hand-rendered typography, and posters based on them. This creative endeavor culminated with an exhibition of these new works in a gallery exhibition.

Marius Valdes was born and raised in Charleston, South Carolina in the United States. He received his MFA in Visual Communication from Virginia Commonwealth University. He has shown his artwork in exhibitions in Colorado, Georgia, Las Angelas, South Carolina, and Virginia in addition to private and commercial commissions from across the United States. Valdes’ commercial artwork has received awards from design publications including Print and Communication Arts, and professional organizations such as the Advertising Federation of Charleston, and the American Institute of Graphic Arts. Valdes currently lives in Columbia, SC where he is an Assistant Professor of Graphic Design at the University of South Carolina.

See more of his work at www.zoovaldes.com.