Helen Murgatroyd

Really lovely lecture from a designer we can relate to. She spoke to use about the work she did in university and then on to her MA printing course. Sweet girl who seemed very relaxed talking to everyone. Her work was lovely as well. Her drawing and mapping work was simple but still executed brilliantly. The printing work seemed different from her past work, which I found a bit of a shame, as her idea of using a pencil to map everything could have been expanded in my opinion. One thing you could tell though is that she really enjoys her work and the freedom she has to develop her style further. Her message was to take your time in finding your style, as it will come in time, which is so true. By experimenting we will find it. She was so great with her work and advice; I think I’m actually a bit jealous of her! Here’s her website.

http://www.helenmurgatroyd.co.uk/

Dead Man

Right, to get it out of the way, I have to say, I love Johnny Depp. Judge all you like, but I think he’s really good and some of his films are my favorites. However, I really didn’t like this film. Sorry Mac but I just didn’t understand it. I’m quite good usually at seeing the hidden meaning here it was hidden so deep I lost interest half way through. Some of it was quite humorous but I do hope the next film is easier to understand.

Craig Lecture

What a great lecture!! 100% better than the previous weeks lecture. Interesting and relatable, it even made me feel better about not knowing, or being good at everything. He made it fun and took time to make use a calendar with important dates, including the date of his birthday, and also 12 notes on what to do in your first year of leaving university (and now). His pointers were really good and I loved how have gave the lecture in a casual way which was really refreshing. A Great guy who didn’t want to “blow his own trumpet” when discussing his work, but made it fun of himself showing great self-knowing. Think it will take time for us to become like this but I hope it happens soon.

YCN

Well I hadn’t blogged about this lecture yet because I forgot about it if I’m honest and there isn’t much I can say about it. It’s hard to judge this lecture with the other ones because I felt it wasn’t useful at all. He discussed what we all already new about YCN. It was really dull as well, his voice was one tone and I found myself drifting in and out of the lecture, as I couldn’t concentrate. It just didn’t find it interesting. Sorry.

ijam

Right I have to stop in the middle of my research to tell you what I’ve found! I’m looking into how companies promote themselves to clients, as this is what LBi want us to try and do for them, and I found this. Shackleton, a Spanish design company, couldn’t decide what to give out to there clients for Christmas to say thank you and to promote them. The decision came down to get them either an ipod or a leg of ham (Jamon in Spanish). So they thought why not combine the ideas together to create ijam(in english iHam). This consisted of creating the box, an online website, booklet and a video to explain how to use your new ijam. In a month, the website had 350,000 and the You Tube video had a 100,000 viewers but these weren’t just companies having a look. It was the general public as well. A great example for the LBi project on self-promotion on a wide scale and I’ll use the example in my essay as well. It’s great when you find something that can connect to so many parts of your work. A nice find from just browsing the Internet.

Live brief

LBi have given out a brief on the D&AD website for student/designers a like and myself. The brief is

“use typography across any medium to explore the possibilities of meaning behind the LBi name”

Now, I thought it would be a nice brief at first but I’ve found that I now need to have a good look at the audience to see if I can get more ideas for acronyms. So I’ve set a deadline 2 days of research, so I can then get on with ideas. Hopefully this will be something I stick to because you can get so involved with the research sometimes. I think I need deadline more and more now. The silence brief hasn’t had the a real deadline only for January but I think by setting deadlines with this and the other projects I will keep on top of the work. Wish me luck…

Jessica Heffland

For my essay, Mac gave me a list of people to read up about so it could help me with my writing. Jessica Heffland, a writer for the Observer and a x-student of Paul Rand, was one of them and I have to say her writing is exceptional. I found myself reading article after article because there so easy to read and so insightful. Her writing is refreshing and clever, connecting to her readers from what I can see in the review sections. She covers so many topics in graphic design that if you need a extra quote or two for your essay, or just want some fun reading, have a look!!

http://designobserver.com/author.html?author=397

My little adventure

With a big hole in my pocket, I can honestly say that I enjoyed every minute of my adventure to the Big Apple. So many photographs, happy memories and a note pad full of notes, it’s a time I will never forget. Seeing the big city has given me a need to visit it again... and again! I feel like I’m chattering on but it’s because I can’t explain how amazing it was. The only way I could explain it is by telling you to go yourself. Thanks Sue, Liz and Hitch.

Let the right one in

A lot of people said this film was going to be scary. With Halloween on the Saturday, personally I didn’t want a scary film because I’m not particular good watching them. By that I mean I usually find myself hiding behind my pillow and screaming like an idiot. I was glad however to find I was gladly not scared to my core. In fact the film was amazingly done. Not the scary cliché blood and gore film that I was expecting.

The film is based on a novel from 2004 by John Ajvide Lindqvist. The relationship between the boy, Oskar and the girl, Eli is lovely. She is a vampire but in spite of this they have a beautiful friendship. This is helped by how the writer has effectively chosen to not have them speaking all the time. The pauses in the film are so effective especially when the girl locks Oskar behind a glass door. The pause is long. Then he eventually asks her “are you a vampire?” The pause is almost poetic. A film I would defiantly watch again. If I did have one point to say, it would be that the swimming pool scene, where you see the legs moving through the water, it seemed a tad unreal. It didn’t balance with the rest of the film that was fantastic.

Corner house- Bloomberg New Contemporaries

One Tuesday, I took time to go to the corner house new exhibit. There is a quote on the Internet about it.

"New Contemporaries, formerly Young Contemporaries has a long and illustrious history, dating back to the first exhibition of young graduates in 1949. For the past 60 years this annual show has been dedicated to profiling the work of young, new and emerging artists at the start of their professional careers. Through its annual presence, New Contemporaries has identified serious artists from each generation and given them the opportunity to show for the first time. The premise remains the same today."

The exhibit itself was ok. Nothing really special in my opinion but there was one piece of work I liked. Freya Wright, created small canvas pieces that had some really lovely narrative imagery. I could imagine the story in the image, which is something I like doing when looking at design work. It was definitely a hidden gem in the group as there were some really strange pieces in there. One was work about sex, which I looked at for about 5 minutes and walked away as it seemed so out of place. Very strange work t exhibit together but nice to take some time off from work.

Nicola Rowland

A self-employed designer, who graduated last year, she came in just to give us some extra advice and it was really helpful. She is personally interested in seeing the connection between words and images but I found here advice to be a great. Here’s a list of key things she says we should do.

• Be nice to teachers in uni
• Email genuine letters
• Be yourself, don’t be wacky
• Online presence or pdf portfolio is needed
• Don’t put all your eggs in one basket, try everything
• Ask questions
• Be aware of everything
• Keep in touch with placements

All great advice I’ll definitely keep in mind! Here is some her work that I like also. Really nice work too.. think i might be tad jealous of her talent and advice!

Diving Bell and the butterfly

To start I can only say this was my favorite film from the Kino series so far! I had never heard about the film before and the only description I had heard was “just wait and see, it’s great” I agree completely. This film is about Jean Dominique Bauby, who had a big stroke, which left him suffering with a medical condition called locked-in syndrome. A truly beautiful film, he has no control over his body, except for being able to blink, his only way of communicating. The film is so well done that you can understand how frustrating it must be not to have any control. It made me realize how fragile life can be and is for many, to a point where it touched me emotionally. I haven’t been to a film that’s has done that in a long time! An amazing film I’ll watch again. I bought it the day after!:)

Silence update

I was told of these two designers, Michael Craig Martin (first image) and Patrick Caulfield (second). They helped me with my experiments to try and show a world without communication. They’re designs seem to show an everyday scene but it has a surreal feel to it that’s almost silent. They helped a lot, as this was the type of idea I had in my head but couldn’t describe verbally. Even thought it helped in my experimentation, I wish I could have a “eureka” moment with my final design idea! Ah well, back to the drawing board.

Apology!!

For the last couple of weeks, life has been so busy! Does seem like things are getting out of hand, I guess that’s the price of 3^rd year for you. So this is my big apology for the non-blogging recently. Hopefully the plan for the next couple of weeks will help me keep on track. Let’s hope it works..

My Beautiful Poster I bought!!

For years now I feel that when some people create poster for theatre production, they're usually complicated and they really don't need to be. When I was in the Globe theatre in London I bought this poster that is now on my bedroom wall. The best 3 pounds I've spent : ) It’s just elegant and simple, showing in this simple illustration, the love between the two. Passing his heart to her. Brilliant.

Another photograph from ANTM

I really want to do a photo shoot with paint! It would be so much fun and if you do it right you might get the same result as this. Beautiful.

“Fuerzabruta”

Whilst watching a old episode of American Next Top Model, they did a photo shoot where the models had to be like the show Fuerzabruta. A show from the Argentine creators of the long-running “De La Guarda,” is another entry in a dependable if not exactly venerable genre: theater for people who don’t really like theater. Patrons are not required to think, feel or even sit down for this hourlong sensory bath at the Daryl Roth Theater. Standing and gaping are all that is strictly necessary, although jumping up and down and dancing are intermittently encouraged. They were able to create amazing shots of them as you can see in the first photographs above. But what I really want to do is to find how I can go to see this show! The images below the photographs taken by the American’s Next Top Model look fantastic and want to see it. If I find out where and how I will let everyone know.

Julian Tevelyan

I came across Trevelyan who was interested in Surrealism. Influenced by Klee and encouraged by his friendship with Miró and Calder, he gradually developed his own mode of abstract Surrealism. In A Symposium, the image above, Trevelyan combined painting and carving and attached parts to the wooden panel. He later recalled: ‘I had invented a sort of mythology of cities, of fragile structures carrying here and there a few waif-like inhabitants.’ Simple but full of interesting parts and delicate looking. Might try to look at more ideas created by him to see if it can inspire me more in future projects.

Robert Smithson

A compelling designer I found in the Tate and forgot about till now. His work consist of a map depicts an area of the shore of Cayuga Lake in New York State. Starting at the Andrew Dickson White Museum at Cornell University in Ithaca, Smithson carried a mirror northwards to the Cayuga Salt Works. At eight locations, marked on the map with Letraset letters, he placed the mirror in the landscape and photographed it. The images in the mirror were not intended to record the sites themselves but, rather, to show nature reflected back at itself. Nice idea and it was similar to an idea I had in the silence project of a peaceful reflection.

A world without communication

With the silence project I mentioned, I’ve decided to go with my thought that silence is when someone doesn’t communicate, but does it have to be someone. Could it be when something doesn’t communicate? Everyday we are given information and people take it for granted. Thanks to Jemma she handed me a piece of paper that explained how communication whether it’s from a digital clock, t.v. Advert, Logo, boy or girl sign in the toilet, is all a form of this. This is defiantly what I would like to concentrate on. How the world would be silent without visual communication. As I think about it more and more I hope to be able to visually show this for the next meeting.

He is a sculptor, best known for his public art installations typically featuring very large replicas of everyday objects. I was able to see his work for myself and that’s the plug image above and I just found it to be very unique and fun side to looking at it all. I like looking outside of graphic design for inspiration sometimes as it sometimes looking outside of the box in different design environments. Fun to look at and sometimes out of the ordinary.

Alice and wonderland

I know I’m behind the times showing these photographs from the up and coming film of Alice and Wonderland but I just remembered about it. The make-up and the digital changes are amazing and I can’t wait to go and see it.

No logo

I Sao Paulo A fed up with the rampant advertising smothering his city, São Paulo's mayor, Gilberto Kassab, passed legislature last year effectively banning all outdoor advertising in Brazil's largest metro. Six months later, the removal of all the advertising is nearly complete and the city looks eerily vacant. Photographer Tony de Marco has a slideshow up on flickr documenting the decontamination of what Mayor Kassab has called São Paulo's "visual pollution" problem. Really interesting thought and combines a little with my idea of blocking communication. Images are powerful in themselves!

Post secret

I way of telling your secret without having to say who you are. A simple idea where you can unload your secrets and get them off your chest and you design them. This was a book that influenced me in a project last year. I love how Frank Warren decided to get his audience to participate in his project as, to me; it gives more of a personal touch to it all. Here are some of my favorites above.

Russian Revolution Posters

When visiting the Tate there was a whole section dedicated to the Red Star Over Russia. At first, few Russian political posters featured women. Those that portrayed female figures did so allegorically: women were used to represent abstract ideas such as freedom or liberty. In 1918, after women were emancipated in the communist revolution, posters had more realistic representations: women depicted as workers and purveyors of socialist thought. They were powerful, bold and thought provoking. Here are some examples of this. They really do stand out to me so I thought I would give them a mention. First posters that I’ve seen of this age that make women look powerful instead of dainty little women who just clean the house for there husbands like in American posters.