Agoura Hills artist designs platinum albums, more

By Michael Picarella pic@theacorn.com

JANN HENDRY/Acorn Newspapers WALL OF FAME-Agoura Hills commercial artist Helane Freeman has amassed an impressive tally of design projects including album covers, movie trade ads and sets for TV programs.

Agoura Hills resident Helane Freeman, 40, is a commercial artist with quite a resumé.

The talent behind such projects as the "Schindler’s List" national movie print ad campaign, "Dumb and Dumber" and "Jurassic Park" movie trade ads, and designs for the TV shows "Head Over Heels" and "Malcolm and Eddie," Freeman also has designed logos for various businesses and video game manuals and album covers for famous musicians such as Frank Sinatra.

Freeman illustrated three California Raisins album covers, including the original, which went golden platinum. The Smithsonian in Washington, D.C. later did a display on the California Raisins merchandising.

The California Raisins was the first golden platinum album in Freeman’s career, but not the last. She collected two others, three platinum records, a Hollywood Reporter Key Art Award and others.

Expressing the desire to one day design just fine art, Freeman said she feels she must still mature in her work. But she’s already begun her own style of fine art, which blends realism and abstract art.

Freeman spoke with The Acorn recently about her work, how she developed as an artist, how she obtained her jobs when she graduated from college, and how she became a major player in the art world.

How and when did you find your love for art?

"It’s kind of a funny story. I went to Westlake High School the very first year it was built. . . . On my birthday, which was on a school night, I asked my mom if I could sleep over at a friend’s house . . . It was my 14th birthday, and the one friend I chose for the sleepover was an artist. She’d been taking private lessons since she was 9 years old.

"She showed me all these incredible drawings and paintings and I said, ‘Wow, I want to do this.’ She said, ‘I have an art lesson in the morning. Do you want to go?’ She called the teacher and got permission for me to go."

So, up until you were 14 years old you never really had an interest in drawing?

"No, I used to draw and paint and create things all the time, but I never really connected that to ‘this is something that I could do for a living.’ It was just something that I enjoyed and did. I used to cut up little pieces of paper . . . I remember ruining clothes with paint."

What do you enjoy most about art?

"I love the creative process. The creative process is exhilarating. . . . I go to the dentist or doctor’s office with my kids and I have a sketchbook. Most people read a magazine. I draw. I just love it."

Who as an artist do you admire most?

"Drew Struzan. He’s a huge motion picture one-sheet illustrator. He did all the "Harry Potter" movie posters. He’s done the "Back to the Future" movie posters—he’s done every great movie poster that’s been illustrated. I actually got to take a workshop with him when I was in college."

Where did you study art?

"I went to Art Center College of Design in Pasadena. But I started with Carol Heyer, who’s the instructor I took the semi-private lessons with (at 14 years old)—she’s a local artist in Thousand Oaks."

When did you graduate from Art Center?

"January of 1987."

After you graduated, how did you start getting work?

"When I graduated, I decided then that I was going to go freelance. I knew when I was in college that I really wanted to focus my energies on staying in California. At the time, there were two really big schools of thought. You were either an editorial illustrator and you painted in oils and you went to New York, or you painted in acrylic, airbrush—really kind of a Hollywood sort of entertainment industry vibe—and you stayed in California.

"I knew I wanted to stay in California, and so while I was at Art Center, I really focused on airbrushing, illustration-type work and entertainment-type work. So I got out of school, got a portfolio together and hit the streets. I just started cold calling . . . I found a book called ‘Photographer’s Market,’ and I figured if people bought photography, they would also buy illustrations. And so I started calling people and asked who their art buyers were. I explained to (those buyers) that I was an artist and that I’d like to show them my portfolio.

What was your big break?

"I was on Sunset Boulevard in Hollywood and I had interviewed with a small independent record label and they didn’t have a need for me. But I said to them, ‘Do you know anybody who might be in need of my services?’ The woman said to me, ‘You know, there’s another record label right here in the building up on the eighth floor.’

"So I got in the elevator and I went up to the eighth floor. I walked into the record label office and handed a little promotional card that I had made to (the person) who happened to be the creative director. She looked at it and said, ‘Wow, I just hired somebody to colorize some old black and white photos, but I like the way you do it better.’ She brought me in and just started hiring me for work.

"That was Priority Records, and at the time Priority Records was five employees. It’s now one of the largest independent labels. I got in there on the ground floor and I worked for them freelance for about the next three years. I did over 100 record album covers for them."

What was your first paying job?

My actual first paying job, believe it or not, I got when I was 14 years old. I had done a drawing of an eagle for a friend of mine in school. A friend of his father who owned a sewing machine company saw it and thought it was really good. He said, ‘Well, I have this sewing machine company and I need to do some ads.’ So he called me out of the blue one day and asked if I could do drawings for him for advertisements. I said, ‘Sure.’ And he hired me.

"My first real job was—I was 16 years old—I got it when I was in the art department at Westlake High School. On the job board, there was a job for an artist at a company called Canyon Research Group in Westlake. I went and applied and got the job. From 16 years old to the point I went to college, I worked there . . . They gave me an office with a ping-pong table, wood-paneled walls and a big drafting table—I was so happy.

What was your first really big job?

"The California Raisins. That was back in 1989. But I didn’t know it was big when I was working on it. It was just another job for me. And then it took off."

Freeman’s work subsequently got bigger as did her reputation. She often worked through the night.

About eight years ago, Freeman cut her workload to start a family. She and her husband have a daughter, 8, and a son, 6. Both children have already taken up art.