Our Team Shares Their Favourite Artists
The artists you love reveal something true about you.
We asked a few members of the creative team at WSS to share the artists they keep coming back to, the ones who crack something open in them, shift how they see, inspire or just simply stop them cold. The list spans generations, mediums, and styles and every single one has that rare quality: they stay with you long after you’ve looked away.
For Josh, our Art Director, that inspiration shows up in the work of Jess Pollard.
It’s hard to talk about Jess Pollard’s work without sounding a little bit in awe of it. What stands out most to him is something simple but rare: confidence. Even her doodles feel intentional, like every line landed exactly where it was supposed to. Whether she’s working in realism, bold pop art, vintage tattoo-inspired pieces, or something more cartoony, nothing feels out of place. There’s an effortlessness to it, but the kind that only comes from serious skill.
What makes her work stick, though, is the range. One moment it’s a chaotic, funny comic character, and the next it’s something conceptual that completely shifts your perspective.
Just when you think you’ve got a handle on what she does, she veers into something unexpected, like a deep dive into vintage tattoo studies… or crabs. “It’s really not fair,” Josh jokes, and honestly, it tracks.
Her work sits in that rare space where it’s both inspiring and just genuinely fun to look at. You can study it and feel pushed to loosen up, stop overthinking, and trust your instincts, or you can just scroll and enjoy it. Either way, it hits.
Check out more of her work here: https://jesspollard.squarespace.com/
For Jocelan, our Director, inspiration comes from something quieter:
Atmosphere, observation, and the feeling a story leaves behind. That’s part of what makes Jacques Tati’s work so compelling. A French filmmaker active mainly from the 1940s to the 1970s, Jacques Tati is best known for his visually driven, dialogue-light comedies that gently satirize modern life and technology, stripping everyday situations down into sharp, observational humour. It’s less about the plot and more about the moments: small gestures, visual gags, quiet character beats. In a way, it almost feels anti-movie. There’s no big narrative arc pulling you along, just the feeling of being there.
Image source: https://www.cinematheque.qc.ca/en/cinema/monsieur-hulots-holiday/
And that feeling is exactly why Jocelan keeps coming back to Mr. Hulot’s Holiday, finding in its quiet chaos and gentle observation a familiar kind of humour that turns everyday awkwardness into something strangely comforting and deeply human. For her it’s become a kind of escape, a way to reset.
Watching Mr. Hulot’s Holiday feels like being transported to the south of France, listening to the waves and watching a man quietly exist in his own odd rhythm. There’s something grounding about its simplicity, and that’s what makes it linger.
Mon Oncle (My Uncle), 1958; https://melodyhansen.substack.com/p/the-wonderful-world-of-jacques-tati
Another favourite is Mon Oncle, which carries that same quiet charm and observational humour that makes Tati’s work feel timeless.
When we asked Jam, our Generalist Designer, to pick a favourite artist, their inspirations are varied…
She gave us a whole list, most of them working across games, film, and animation. But if they had to choose just one, Jeff Simpson stands out. A Vancouver-based concept artist with years of experience in visual development, his work carries a kind of depth that’s hard to shake. It’s fluid and expressive, but never uncontrolled. Every brushstroke feels deliberate, every unfinished edge intentional.
There’s something immersive about Jeff’s paintings. They feel deep, sometimes almost unsettling, like staring into dark water and not knowing what makes the work so powerful. Whether it’s detailed industry work or more experimental personal pieces exploring flesh, machinery, and abstraction, there’s always a strong sense of purpose behind it.
For Jam, that balance is also a lesson. It’s easy to get caught up in overworking details and trying to make everything perfect. Simpson’s work is a reminder to pull back, focus on fewer, more intentional strokes, and trust what’s implied. Beyond all the technical admiration, though, there’s a simpler truth: the work just sticks. At least enough to keep it in constant rotation as desktop wallpaper.
Check out his work: https://www.artstation.com/jeffsimpson
Even though their inspirations are completely different, there’s a common thread running through all of them:
The artists that stay with us tend to shape the way they create, think, and see the world around us.
Different artists have different styles, and many different reasons for loving the artist they go to inspiration for. But one pattern shows up constantly, and that’s the fact that we’re all just a bit influenced by the things we can’t stop looking at.
Sometimes it’s technical brilliance and sometimes it’s just pure nostalgia. And sometimes, it’s even, “I don’t know why I love this and now I want to do something about it.” But that’s kind of the point, because inspiration isn’t clean or structured. It’s messy, overlapping, and sometimes completely unexplainable, and that’s probably why we keep chasing it.
