Mārtiņš Zutis was born in Riga in June of 1988 amid the beginnings of so-called Singing Revolution in the Baltic states. Singing was his other hobby as a child, but mainly he devoted his free time to drawing, cutting and gluing tiny paper tanks and soldiers. Interest in the military faded as he joined cub scouts willing to get a Stetson hat seen in photos of scouts in Canada, but was disappointed to receive a beret instead. After finishing an art-oriented primary school, he got really interested in programming and continued his studies in a high school devoted to exact sciences, but then returned to humanities after being accepted into the Art Academy of Latvia where he finished his Master’s studies in Visual Communication department. The interest in illustration arose during an exchange semester in UdK Berlin and with the establishment of “Kuš!” comics magazine in Riga where he started to submit his explorations in visual narrative. Since 2013 he has also been illustrating literature for children, including his own picture book “Nenotikušais atklājums” in 2015, which earned him International Baltic Sea Region Jānis Baltvilks Prize in Children’s Literature and Book Art for best debut and was also included in White Ravens catalouge 2016. Mārtiņš still publishes his short stories in various comics magazines and practices singing when nobody is around.