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[Tapas Insider] Between Horror and Cute - Koolaid-Girl

When Dr. Jeremonth wakes from his nightmare, he does not yet realize the dark and twisted path that lies right before his feet. The world of “Living When Dead” is frighteningly dark yet stunningly colorful, heartbreakingly sad and incredibly funny. It is the world created by Koolaid-Girl, an artist of Native American descent who impresses with many unique talents and a fascinating story.

He was right. 

Koolaid-Girl started her creative journey on days off from school at her mother’s workplace, when her mother let her use an old computer. “She let me get on there and play with MS Paint. I used a mouse for the first few years, up until about 2011,” Koolaid-Girl mentions casually, despite my gasps of surprise. “When comic markers would cost $7 a pop and with other traditional paint being incredibly expensive, being able to create for free on MS Paint was the way to go!”

Koolaid’s incredible MS Paint artwork can be found all over the internet, with speedpaints on Youtube and a very active and bright Instagram account just to name a few. MS Paint is a program that is very rarely used by artists due to its many limitations, but that clearly didn’t stop Koolaid-Girl from becoming a creator with a unique style and a color palette that not even a unicorn could create in its wildest fever dreams.

“All of my art is pretty much self-taught. I didn’t really get into it until my senior year in highschool, when I was put into the highest art class. Then I went into a really cheap community college, took an art history class, a life drawing class, and that was pretty much it in terms of an art degree.”

Koolaid-Girl’s comic, “Living When Dead,” is the story of a man who attempts to beat death itself, which goes awfully wrong. Horror isn’t a very widespread genre in comics, but Koolaid-Girl always loved it. “I was very horror-prone as a child. I would always watch Jaws as a child, but only while in the bathtub.” 

When asked if she imagined fighting the shark like the characters in Jaws do, she giggles. “No, I actually always wanted to be friends with the shark. I’ve always been a big horror buff, but I was also really into bright colors. Unicorns, Gremlins, sharks, and big scary animals that I wanted to be friends with - all of those interests kind of came together and shaped my art style.”

Because of her portfolio, Koolaid-Girl landed her first graphic design job working for a company that, among other things, created and printed T-shirts. “I liked it in the beginning, but after a while I felt like I had no freedom. When I tried to branch out creatively, they didn’t like any of my designs and it felt very creatively binding. I didn’t enjoy having no freedom with anything.”

Koolaid-girl eventually left that job and began to freelance for other T-Shirt companies, during which she began an internship in the creative department of Tapas. After a short stint with another job, she returned and is now a full-time member of the team.

“I’ve always used Tapas and now I work for this website!” she laughs. “It’s kind of crazy! I like everyone here. It’s been the most fun and enjoyable job I’ve ever had.” Coming from the outside, Koolaid-Girl was surprised by how friendly everyone on the team was. “I guess coming from places where no one was really nice, you kind of expect that there will be some mean people at this company as well. But everyone ended up being so nice and friendly, it is kind of a shock!” 

I questioned if she ever gets bored of drawing Tapamon over and over again, but she laughed. “That’s so much better than being asked to go on Google and trace images because that’s what the clients want.”

If you have followed Koolaid-girl in the past, or are checking out her work now, you may notice a recurring figure on her social media. Images and gifs of Woody, the main character of Pixar’s Toy Story franchise, can be found wherever Koolaid-Girl spends time - to the point where we have not one, but three different Woody emojis in our company chat program. So of course, I had to find out what this was all about.

“Everyone asks that and is always surprised by the answer,” she laughs. “It all started when my mom got me a very ugly Woody figure she found at the thrift store.” She had thought of her daughter when she came across it. “It was the most hideous Woody doll I’ve ever seen! I was dumbfounded by how awful Woody looks as an actual toy! So I had to start collecting the really ugly ones. Now I’m collecting all of the Woodies, ugly or not!” 

Before I let her go back to her important work of making Tapamon look as amazing as possible, I asked Koolaid-Girl if there was anything she wanted to share with young and upcoming creators. “Don’t stop creating. ‘Cause you never know! You could grow into something way better and bigger than what you immediately thought you were going to be. And it could lead you somewhere that makes your life just fantastic.”

I think that’s something we can all get behind.

For fans of her comic, here is some exciting news! “Living When Dead” will return and it will be better than ever! Make sure to subscribe here so you can stay up to date with everything that’s going on! You can also find her on Instagram and Twitter!

Thank you for reading!

Isabell / AKA Ratique

Creator Happiness Manager