Hello world! My name is Yannick, I was born in 1992 and as long as I can remember, I always loved art. I was a very shy kid and used to live in my own little imaginary worlds a lot. I vividly remember sneaking into our living room in the middle of the night, because MTV Germany used to show Japanese anime after dark. Sorry mom! Of course I was way too young too really understand what was going on at that time and most of these series were in English and didn't have subtitles yet, but I didn't care. I just sat there staring at these images of giant robots fighting, pirates and soldiers flying through space, dystopian cities full of color and light, machines with human bodies and I remember dreaming myself into these worlds. When 1999 came around, a movie hit German theaters called Star Wars - A Phantom Menace and when I saw the galaxy far far away for the first time, I think it's fair to say that it blew my little kid brain. From that moment I knew I wanted to do something like that! Of course at that point I had no idea about what 'that' meant or how to get there, I just knew I wanted to create my own worlds and tell fantastical stories. Unfortunately as things go when you are young and have dreams about doing something creative, people told me that I should rather look at getting a 'real' job, because creative jobs are rare and that you can't live off being an artists. So I kinda buried that dream for a long time. Fifteen years later after numerous failed attempts at finding a 'proper job', lots of discussions and doubt, I enrolled at university to study Intermedia Design, which is just is a fancy word for a non-specified design based study program. It was here, through a lecture given by a fellow student, where I first heard the term 'concept art' and learnt what that meant. I got so excited about this topic, that I immediately went home after class and bought 'The Skillful Huntsman' and suddenly a whole new world opened up for me. It was like I was back at home in our living room again. I knew I wanted to become a concept artist! Yet again, there were people telling me that it was super hard to get into Concept Art. I should rather pursue 3D, because 3D Artists were in higher demand and that it was more "safe" than Concept Art. And for a second time I started to doubt myself and went ahead and put my dream in a box, in favor of doing something more safe. I simply felt miserable the next three years because of that. In 2020 I finally chose to listen to myself over the opinions of others and went ahead to pursue a career in concept art, no matter the cost. I bought every art book, every tutorial I could get my hands on and studied day in and day out, because now I had some time to make up for. I wanted to create fantastical worlds, creepy creatures, shady characters, props, vehicles ... I wanted to tell stories. Well, fast forward one and a half years later, despite a global pandemic wreaking havoc and despite the doubts that others put in my mind, I managed to get my first job as a freelance concept artist. I can finally follow my true passion and actually make a living through creating art. To come to an end, I would like say that I think that this work that we do is like magic. We possess the ability to create new things from the images in our heads, our thoughts and experiences and communicate to the world what we maybe can not put into words through art. That is ultimately what I want to do with my life. I want to inspire some kid, somewhere and make them want to create their own worlds and tell their own stories, the same way I got inspired way back. Because these stories that we tell, will remain even past our own time. Art is magic.