Maxim Tooker MSAI

My academic training was through a Bachelor of Environmental Design and Masters in Architecture at the University of Tasmania in Australia, my scholarship focused on architecture that was sustainable and deeply routed in the cultural and historic frameworks of communities. I was particularly interested in the history and theory of pre-modern cities and architecture, and how this may begin to inform new ways of exploring architecture and architectural theory.

My technical design training and professional background has allowed my work to emphasise the colourful and whimsical whilst allowing for my drawings to communicate a design reality. I focus on illustrating my client’s works in a way in which the viewer can not only get a sense of what the scheme will look like when completed, but the essence, feeling and experiential character of the building, landscape and its environs.

My personal work focuses on exploring traditional architecture, particularly the Middle Ages, which is a period that forms a significant inspiration for me. I sketch both from life and photography, and enjoy creating my own imagined buildings and cityscapes inspired by historical study. Referencing back to heritage and understanding craft and historical architectural theory continues to inform my personal and professional work.

My professional work is a mixture of both hand and digital media. Depending on the extent of the modeled work of my clients, I use basic digital 3D massing models to the sketch the reductive forms of their scheme by hand, from whence I build the composition and level of detail through a series of sketches over tracing paper. The final image is then drawn in detail with pen-and-ink on vellum paper and scanned. From here I use photoshop to add colour and texture to the visual, where I issue a series of drafts to the client and work with them on how best to communicate the materiality and character of their emerging scheme through a revision process. Some visuals involve me creating both the landscape and buildings entirely as a scamp-artist, whilst other more resolved detail designs are carefully referenced into the final image. I work as much by hand on paper as possible to allow the drawings to have a natural and human feeling.

My personal work is usually rendered entirely by hand using graphite, charcoal, ink and watercolour as my preferred traditional mediums.