Sylvan started his career as a professional freelance illustrator in 1983. From the first moment he worked for multinational Philips Classics as their main illustrator for the cd covers of the classical music products. Over the years Sylvan developed himself as an artist and illustrator who can identify himself with any customer and art director. This resulted in a development of a lot of painting styles such as realistic, impressionistic, surrealistic, abstract, naive and so on. He also mastered a lot of different techniques. Depending on the desired results and radiation Sylvan works with acrylics, oil paint, airbrush and digital. It is his aim to identify himself with the communication objectives of his customers in such a way that he can translate these objectives into images and pictures in order to reach the target group. Twice he won the first prize of the Dutch Illustrator Association that is held yearly (Category editorial and category packaging) exhibited in the Museum of Modern Art, Stedulijk Museum in Amsterdam. In 2005 he won the first even Gouden Peperbus Award for Best Outside Poster Advertising, with the Matinair poster "Tobago".