Me

Roland Scriver grew up in the strangely liminal landscape of west London. Born in a former cottage hospital that has since become a Hindu temple, he was raised beside the Bath Road, with Heathrow Airport to the south and the M4 to the north. To the west stood a Saxon church where the composer William Byrd was once accused of recusancy; to the east, parkland that had once belonged to the Knights Templar. It was a rapidly urbanised corner of the capital that somehow remained isolated, suspended between histories, landscapes and identities.

Much of his childhood beyond school was spent in the countryside of southern England, a welcome counterpoint to an economically deprived community where few people expected to leave, and fewer were encouraged to imagine lives beyond its boundaries.

Growing up surrounded by books, Roland found early refuge in history, folklore, mythology and the natural world. These interests became the foundation of his creative imagination long before music took hold during his teenage years.

Art school followed, but money was tight and several years of low paid dead end jobs brought Roland closer to local music scenes as both an escape and an artistic outlet. Roland played in a number of underground bands, experiences that eventually led him back into education to study Graphic Design and Typography at the London College of Print. The music industry provided his first professional design commissions, creating record sleeves before he moved into a career producing physical on-set graphics for film and television.

Working under the name Familiar Ink, Roland continues to work as a freelance designer and illustrator while completing a Master's degree in Illustration at Falmouth University.

He sees the role of an illustrator, first and foremost, as a creative visual problem solver.