OLIVER WEISS:
Biography in Brief
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the Oliver Weiss Fact Sheet (PDF)
About the Artist
Oliver Weiss is a freelance
illustrator and designer from Germany who has lived in the United States and
Canada for several years. He works for a great many international clients from
North America, Asia, and Europe.
His
clients include DER SPIEGEL, DIE ZEIT, The
Writer, Random House, LatinFinance, Axel Springer, Hong Kong Tatler, German
Trade Union, Burda, IDG, Euromoney, Deutsche Bank, Rowohlt, Tesa, CBS, Expedia,
nature, Ravensburger, Euro RSCG, RWE, Tecniche nuove, Gabler, Siemens and the
European Union.
Bio
Specs
Oliver’s career as
illustrator,
designer and artist is somewhat unique in that he is self-taught in everything
he has professionalized on. He holds a master’s degree ("Diplom-Ingenieur") in
Electrical Engineering and Information Technology from the University of
Technology, Munich, specializing in signal processing and speech analysis.
Drawing Cartoons for a Living
Oliver Weiss supported his university
years by
creating cartoons and
illustrations for some of Germany’s largest daily papers, including Süddeutsche
Zeitung, DIE WELT, and Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, as well as
for hundreds of special-interest publications from around the world. This is where his
profession as a self-taught illustrator and designer was initiated.
During graduation and after, while still
supporting himself entirely on cartoons, Oliver was torn
between making a living as a professional artist and seeking a post-graduation
academic position in the fields of either ethology (voice analysis in bonobos, cetaceans and
birds) or phonetics (speech analysis in humans).
To this end, he spent a total of over a
year at
world-renowned ethologist Konrad Lorenz’s Max Planck Institute for Behavioral
Physiology with human ethologist, Irenäus Eibl-Eibesfeldt, as well as at universities in
Germany and France.
Settling for the Worlds of Art,
Design and Journalism
Around 1996, with the Deutsche Bank
approaching him for a major illustration assignment, Oliver decided to settle
for illustration, design and journalism. While working as a
freelance journalist for a variety of magazines and as editor for a major
publication for C.H. Beck, Germany’s largest legal publisher, he evolved into one of
the country's first web
site developers, working for
large-scale clients
from publishing and for
major law firms.
He also published and edited the aforementioned legal magazine's online edition
for a period of more than two years. He was successively contracted by
AOL to edit a
legal online publication. In 1999, Oliver's web site for
Haarmann Hemmelrath, then
among the country’s top five law firms, was awarded a
first prize (3,500
EUR) in recognition of what the jury at the German Bar Association considered to be Germany's best law firm web site.
Later that year, he launched his very own
legal magazine, LEGAmedia, an online-only publication
for which he served also as editor-in-chief over the next five years. Following
Oliver's three-month stint in New York City, LEGAmedia quickly evolved
into one of the world’s largest legal web sites, featuring exclusive
authors
like former NYC mayor, Ed Koch, Harvard's strategic management guru, Michael
Porter, and hundreds of partners from major international law firms.
From Web Sites to Multimedia
Projects
Oliver has worked on a great many
web site and multimedia
ventures (which include animation and soundtracks) for
clients from Germany, the United States and Asia. He has also put a focus on
corporate design projects ranging from developing
corporate identity strategies to logo designs, stationery, brochures,
kitchenware and
collateral. Oliver also works as a friend of the court
for design and multimedia engineering.
While shifting his focus every now and
then over the years, Oliver has never ceased to follow his passion for
illustration and painting. After working from Canada for half a year in 2003, more and
more international clients started flocking.
Oktoberfest Poster Design and Book
Designs
Winning the first prize (10,000 EUR)
in the closed competition to create the official
Oktoberfest poster artwork for 2008 on behalf of the city of Munich,
Oliver's design has been featured on a multitude of
merchandising products ranging from the official collector’s item beer stein
to t-shirts and mugs. This tops off a series of competition
awards Oliver has received over time.
Recent projects include
jacket
designs and illustrations for book publishers like Random House, Rowohlt
and Campus. Oliver has created the design for
Wer bin ich? ("Who am I?"), a Goldmann Verlag book on philosophy
by Richard David Precht which has been the highest selling nonfiction book in Germany
during 2008. Other book designs of Oliver's include novels like Gregory David
Roberts' worldwide bestseller,
Shantaram, and nonfiction books on society, politics and science. |
