OUGD402 - Studio Brief 02 - The Orange Juice Compendium

Collecting the information for this zine was a relatively complex process, as each variation of orange juice had to be individually bought, tasted, and reviewed. In the end I reviewed seven different types of orange juice from varying sources - most were purchased from shops, some were purchased at restaurants, and one was actually an apple juice. I selected a range of different categories on which to base my review, including colour as a Pantone shade, smoothness, and price. Each one was then giving an overall five star rating.

final reviews drawn out in order onto zine stock

OUGD402 - Studio Brief 02 - Moon/Sun

Creating the content for this zine was relatively quick: it simply involved marking out on each page where the words would sit, making sure that the movement of the words mirrored each other as they rose and fell across the page, and after that it was a quick job to stamp out the words. It is the simplicity of this zine that gives it it's sense of humour and intrigue.

final content arranged in order on zine stock

OUGD402 - Studio Brief 02 - 0, 10, 100, 1000 Circles

This zine was the most time consuming of the series as each circle had to be hand drawn. The pages that involved 0, 10 and 100 circles were relatively quick to complete, whereas the page with 1000 circles took slightly longer at about ten minutes, averaging two circles a second. At this speed I had predicted that drawing 10,000 circle would take 83 minutes, but in reality it took me just over an hour as it was easy to sustain a higher speed over a longer period of time.

final content hand drawn in order onto zine stock

OUGD402 - Studio Brief 02 - Typeface, Colour Scheme and Stock

As I wanted the zines to be entirely hand made, where possible, I did not want to print out any copy using digital methods. A tool I have used before within my past works to create type is a customisable library-style stamp set, as it is a relatively quick and simple way of physically mass producing clean and legible type. It will be used throughout the series to provide continuity and cohesion to the zines as a complete set.

customisable stamp kit

hand-stamped typeface

I wanted the colour palette for this series to fairly refined, as I felt the content of the work was strong enough to carry the concepts and the humour without the need for a large range of colours. Therefore the colours used within the zines will be limited to an orange for the inside of The Orange Juice Compendium zine, red for inside of The History of A Colour, and black for each cover of the zine.

I felt that the stock for these zines should be relatively plain, but with a little texture in order to provide more substance to each page. I chose Cyclus Offset in 100gsm, a 100% recycled paper that contains tiny black flecks embedded in the surface. This texture gave the stock a DIY feel and an almost dirty appearance, which tied in nicely to the handmade aesthetic of the series. For the covers of the zines I chose a thick, generic black card stock at about 300gsm.

OUGD402 - Studio Brief 02 - Zine Mock-Up's

In order to figure out the technical aspects of how to make each zine I created a selection of smaller mock-up's to help my gauge the size, the number of pages in total, the number of pages of content, and the layouts. I referred back to these as guides throughout the whole creating process.

Lord Whitney Studio Visit

During an inspiring visit to a local design studio we met the women behind Lord Whitney, a creative duo who specialise in create 3D and sculptural set designs. It was interesting to hear that they had originally studied at Leeds Beckett, doing a graphic communications subject. Despite both realising that by the end of their degrees, they weren't necessarily happy with the work they were creating, they had enough drive and passion to create a job for themselves that allowed them to just play and create in whatever manner they chose. This was particularly encouraging to hear as it proves that regardless of what degree you actually study, as long as it is within a creative field you can pretty much access every other creative field you have an interest in working in. It was also interesting to see how many projects they had undertaken with high profile clients, and how many of those projects had occurred within Leeds itself. As a student I am very aware of the draw towards London within the creative arts, but it was refreshing to see that many successful artists and designers work and exist outside of that bubble.

Wow What A William Wegman

William Wegman is an American artist, photographer and video maker. Regarded as a pioneering conceptualist, his short films and drawings (particularly those released throughout the 1970's) display his characteristic humour and deadpan presence.

In this video entitled 'Crooked Finger' , the similarities of a

stick and his finger are compared and seemingly exaggerated

X Ray Of Peach In Dish

For A Moment...

16 e's and 16 l's

OUGD402 - Studio Brief 02 - Further Zine Ideas

After some further idea generation I compiled five ideas for the zines that I felt represented the most important areas of my practice as a young creative, while displaying a touch of humour:

The Orange Juice Compendium

A zine comprised of my favourite kinds of orange juice, each meticulously reviewed and rated. This zine reflects my love of documenting, my tendency to collect and compile information about the things that are important to me, and my attention to small details.

 Sketches and potential categories to be included in The Orange Juice Compendium

0, 10, 100, 1000 Circles
A zine that documents the action of hand drawing a large number of circles, the number of which increases exponentially with every page. This zine demonstrates my commitment to physically hand making my works, as well as my dedication to a task, and my interest in performance elements within the creation of artworks.

 Sketches to show the intended progression within 0, 10, 100, 1000 Circles

Moon/Sun

This zine, entitled Moon/Sun, shows my utilisation of text within work, not only from a design perspective, but from an aesthetic perspective as well. Here, I use the text as imagery to demonstrate the movement of the moon and the sun over the course of a day and night. This zine also ties in with my personal love of the universe, and also the frequent use of time within my past works.

Sketches to show the layout of text within Moon/Sun

DanceDanceDance

This zine demonstrates my interest in performance art. Through a series of photos I emulate the performances of the 1960's and 70's, focusing particularly on the movement and exhibition of my own body. Also, with a little humour, it reflects my ability to work with physically both as the creator and the content of the work. 

 Sketch to show the page layout for Dance Dance Dance

The History of A Colour
A zine that examines a simple but humorous view of the history of colour, an area of design that I am interested in. It also acts as an example of how, wherever possible, I like to use history and research to inform my work drawing on eras that are of particular interest to me.

I wanted all of the zines to have a sense of immediacy, as zines are typically made quickly, cheaply and by hand. I personally like to work physically, and that is a big part of my creative process, so I decided that all of these zines would be entirely hand made, where appropriate.

Parallel Magazine

For the past six or seven months I have been working for an independent publication entitled Parallel magazine. Created by a team of all female-identifying creatives and writers, Parallel focuses on social topics, including women's equality issues, within the arts, music, film and literature. During my time so far at LCA I have been lucky enough to continue my work with them, specifically editing and organising page layouts. I have found that being at LCA has helped me particularly with this independent work, as I have leant a lot about publication design, text layout and grid systems. This experience has also been invaluable in helping me understand the importance of roles and communication when working in a team, particularly when the members of this team live all over the world. A selection of the layouts that I have worked on are featured below:

End of Module Five Reflection

The second set of feedback I received on this course was for the submission of module five. I had expected my grade to dip slightly, as I was advised it might do so due to me having settled into the course more, however I received the same grade as the first submission - 74%, or the equivalent of a first. I was pleased with this result as I had enjoyed the briefs within this module more than the first. Again, both of the briefs were new to me, as I have never before had the opportunity to undertake the design of a wayfinding system, or produce a leaflet that would be used to convey public information. However, within these briefs I felt I could explore more of my own ideas and use a wider range of mediums to express my designs, particularly with the leaflet brief. Although demanding at times, I continued with the same level of research for these projects, and I feel that these gave me a solid foundation from which to create a series of successful designs. In my next briefs I would like to move away from digital design and explore the more physical aspects of creation by using a range of different print techniques and realising a more tangible outcome.

OUGD402 - Studio Brief 02 - Zine Sketches

After settling on the idea of creating a series of zines, I then focused on how I could make these zines representational of myself. I wanted the content to reflect my ideas, my style and my personality, but I didn't want to be as obvious as to simply choose my favourite colour or my favourite designers - I want the zines to be able to stand up as individual publications too.

Initially I found it challenging to generate ideas for the zines by simply sitting down and thinking about them, and so instead I consulted a variety of personal lists that I had made when I had thought of a quick or amusing idea for a zine, and written it down. I found this to be much more effective in discovering how I might embed my personality into these zines, as they had all been inspired by things I'd done or places I'd been. The ideas were also one's I had been wanted to try for some time and this was the best opportunity to experiment with new ideas. The humour also felt genuine in a way that it could not had I tried to force an idea.

My initial ideas included:

-A zine of orange juice reviews, inspired by my love of drinking orange juice
-A written score of an interpretive dance, inspired by my interest in performance art
-A number of meaningless, but none-the-less impressive facts about myself
-A zine that would include the same abstract shape on each page with my interpretation alongside (e.g. a bird, a slug)
-My theory about how a really good sandwich should have the automatic ability to turn into an everlasting sandwich
-The first four stills from my favourite film, hand drawn (the same badly drawn image four times)
-A large number of hand drawn circles (10,000+), increasing by the power of ten each page
-My well practiced theory that one can communicate a variety of emotions in any social situation with just a sniff
-The same image photocopied a large number of times, making the images appear abstract over time
-A list of interesting things to do as a designer

I presented these ideas in a critique. Originally I had thought that I would not share many of my ideas through the progression of this project, as the work was intended to be personal to me and not to please a clientele. However, as the work produced would act as a marketing tool, the content I chose would need to be engaging to a wide audience, and so I asked a range of students to select the ideas that they connected to the most, that they found the most humorous, or that they felt demonstrated an aspect of my personality the best. Overall the results were fairly similar, with the Orange Juice, Interpretive Dance and Interesting Things To Do As a Designer ideas being the preferred favourites.

Personally I felt that the Interesting Things To Do As a Designer idea was the most clichéd of all my ideas, as there have been multiple 'How To' guides made for Graphic Designers and this idea could perceived as gimmicky. I discarded this idea and returned to my list as I felt a larger number of zines would portray a more varied portrait of my personality.

Coincidences at the DIY Art Market

Every month or so in the centre of Dalston, London, over 60 artists gather to promote and sell their work in the DIY Art Market. Acting as a celebration of London's independent publishers and emerging artists, the market boasts a huge variety of unique and handmade items for sale, from art prints, zines and independent publications, and illustrations to ceramics, jewellery, and screen prints t-shirts. It's an amazing little arts community that's great for discovering and meeting new artists and designers.

As the market happens so irregularly it was difficult to find a weekend when my timetable would allow me to be in London at the right time. When I finally got the opportunity to go, every creative that I met was more than happy to talk with me about their work and their processes, and my work and interests. One artist that I was particularly interested in was Alex Sickling, a printer, ceramicist and illustrator based in Newcastle - already I was interested in her work, as I am also from Newcastle and Northern artists are something I am always interested in. She describes her work as 'often wonky, lo-fi, and naively made' and we talked briefly about her ceramic pieces, namely her ceramic pots inspired by famous artists. I love her illustration style and the humorous touches to her images make for a collection of highly unique and collectible pieces.

As it turned out, she graduated from Leeds College of Art in 2012, and we discussed the college and our practices and what kind of work we were both interested in - it was such a coincidence but such a great opportunity to talk to someone who had been through the college and come out of the other side with an amazing practice. Going to this art market proved to me, once again, how important it is to just go out and see things, and to meet people and talk to them, because you never know what kind of communities you'll find or what connections you might make.

Works To Know By Heart: An Imagined Museum / 2053: A Living Museum

Two conjoined exhibitions that ran at the Tate Liverpool from 20 Nov - 21 Feb 2016.

'It is the year 2052: museums are becoming obsolete and art is slipping out of human consciousness. A team of curators have retrieved some treasures from the stores of the Centre Pompidou, Paris, the Museum für Moderne Kunst (MMK) in Frankfurt and Tate. Their ideal museum is offered up as a magic cabinet of memories. Visitors must hold those memories in their hearts and minds to preserve whatever it is that makes art important to civilisation.'

The exhibition invited audiences into a fictional scenario in which the exhibited artworks would cease to exist, and asked visitors to memorise the works to secure their future preservation - drawing on Ray Bradbury’s 1953 sci-fi novel Fahrenheit 451, the tale of a distant future in which works of literature are banned and the only way to save them is to learn them by heart.

A highly unique concept for an exhibition - removes the line between artist and viewer and openly invites an audience into a gallery space, a space which is usually exclusively reserved for those in the art world. The gallery itself looses some sort of integrity as a place for exhibiting, but in turn becomes a space that allows open communication, performance, action, and words.

Artist becomes viewer and viewer becomes artist.