“I always wanted to be an illustrator. I had a professor, McRay Magleby, who did a lot of really great work for BYU and it seemed like the kind of design work you could do for universities was always really interesting and varied. Plus, as an illustrator I have the opportunity to do a lot of paintings and illustrations for projects here that I probably wouldn’t have working for an ad agency or design studio.

I used to paint and illustrate everything by hand. The first couple years I started working for this office, I got to do some hand-painted poster illustrations over the summer. I was able to hone a style working on real illustration projects through this office. Around 2000, I developed a graphic illustrative style of using the computer that I’ve been able to apply to a lot of projects here.

I have my hat in three rings. I’m the art director for the university. I also work as a freelance illustrator — which is where I’ve been able to apply my travel style on projects like notecards and posters during the 2002 Olympics and the ‘Welcome to Utah’ billboards. There are seven different billboard designs that have been used at entry points to the state. It is fun when you are coming back from a road trip and you see a sign that says ‘Welcome to Utah’ and you know that was the artwork you created for it. My travel style works perfectly for the GO LEARN! educational trip programs offered through Continuing Education.

And I’ve always painted fine art landscapes. I am represented by David Ericson Fine Art and Evergreen Framing Co. & Gallery Inc. in Salt Lake City and Medicine Man Gallery in Tucson.

Creating illustrations has always been the thing that excited me the most. There are lots of photos of campus settings, but there hasn’t really been a lot of artwork about campus. It is a lot of fun whenever there is an opportunity to create an illustration or painting of something that is campus related.”

— David Meikle, art director, University Marketing & Communications, BFA ‘94 and MFA ‘06