OUGD502 - Studio Brief 02 - Interview Final Outcomes

The final physical deliverables for this brief are below:

Publication

The full publication is below:

Interview with Will Knight by Erin Blamire on Scribd

Printed flags for North-South, Space and Risograph - not hemmed

Presenting these finished deliverables in a final critique was met with positive feedback. It was noted that the print quality of the flags was higher than expected, and although they had not been hemmed due to time constraints, they still provided a high quality response to my interview with Will. The publication also gained positive feedback. It was suggested that the bind quality could have been higher, and although the spine had been damaged slightly during the trimming of the publication, the skill of perfect binding will therefore be something I will work to improve on next year. 

OUGD502 - Studio Brief 01 - Shy Bairns #2 Exhibition Vinyl

One of the tasks I was given during the preparation for the exhibition was to create vinyl lettering for the walls of the exhibition space. As discussed with the group, the exhibition space would include our name, the title of the exhibition and a selection of initials to place next to the exhibited works.

The vinyl designs were created in our typeface and scale to the size of the walls. They were cut from orange vinyl using the digital print facilities at LCA. Once cut, the excess vinyl was removed to leave only the letterforms. The letters were then backed with sticky back plastic to allow for easy transference onto the exhibition walls.

OUGD502 - Studio Brief 01 - Shy Bairns #2 Tote Bags

Alongside the release of the new issue of Shy Bairns, I also created the first pieces in a range of merchandise that the collective will sell to promote the project and raise funding. For the launch of issue #2 the group discussed the creating of tote bags. It was agreed that the design should be the same as the stickers, featuring the grid motif and the typeface used throughout both issue of the publication. 50 tote bags were printed over the course of one day using the traditional print facilities at LCA.

Black and white design

Red design

OUGD502 - Studio Brief 01 - Shy Bairns #2 Exhibition Promotion

To coincide with the official release of Shy Bairns #2, the collective put together a launch and exhibition event at Caustic Coastal in Salford, Manchester. The exhibition included the work of 11 artists from across both Shy Bairns publications, and work ranged from video art, sculpture, photography and textiles.

To promote the event, I created a series of posters based around the cover design for issue #2 for both print in risograph, and use across our social media platforms:

Exhibition poster for print

Square format poster for use on social media

Long format instagram graphic for promotional use

Countdown graphic for use on instagram

OUGD502 - Studio Brief 01 - Shy Bairns Online Curatorship With IsThisIt?

In April 2017, Shy Bairns were given the opportunity to collaborate with IsThisIt?

IsThisIt? is an online platform for contemporary art, created and managed by Bob Bicknell-Knight. Online, it operates as a gallery with weekly exhibitions showcasing emerging to mid-career artists, hosting a roster of guest curators interrogating a variety of different concepts. The website also hosts monthly residencies, where artists are given a web page to create a completely new work that exists on the internet. Offline, it has held exhibitions in venues across the UK. The first printed issue of its magazine is currently in production.

Shy Bairns was offered a week-long residency to curate an interactive webpage within the IsThisIt website. Taking works from Shy Bairns #2, the residency offered the project a new platform to showcase our Northern artists, and included works ranging from performance art, spoken word, sculpture, collage, illustration and textiles.

The residency officially ran from 14th - 21st April, but can still be found here.

OUGD502 - Studio Brief 02 - Interview Publication Design

Alongside the flags, a publication of the interview was also designed. The copy text of the interview was copied directly from the emails sent between myself and Will to create a physical documentation of the conversation. In order to create impactful spreads that would contrast with the clean designs of the flags, the text was laid out in a large type size so that it would cover the majority of the page, with only a small margin.

The pages were not designed to be double sided so as to retain a cleaner order throughout the publication, allowing viewers to easily follow the course of the interview and consume it in a more linear format.

The colour of the text was designed to match the blue colours used in the flags designs. The cover design was taken from one of the flag designs in order to solidly connect the publication to the project without the need for an obvious title to be printing on the cover of the book.

The pages of the book were printed on a medium gloss white stock, 100gsm, and the cover was printed on a matte white stock, 130gsm.

As originally planned, the publication would be bound with a staple, attaching the pages to the back cover to leave an exposed spine. However after printing, the stock used resulted in a 6mm spine, which would be too thick to staple through. As a compromise, the pages were perfect bound in order to retain a similar aesthetic, and this actually resulted in a more professional finish to the publication.

OUGD502 - Studio Brief 01 - NEST Issue 11 Magazine Design

To create consistency between issue 10 and issue 11, the design of the magazine remained almost entirely the same. The print specifications meant that it was again designed as a B5, 32 page, full colour, saddle stitched publication. However as this issue had the theme of space, I wanted the design of the spread to feel more immersive, with little to no negative space. Therefore all of the spreads feature full bleed images. The horizontal NEST tag-line remained on the outer edge of each page, and the page numbers again remained only on right hand side of spread. The names at the top however were separated so that each individual image would be credited. This created a slightly altered grid that encased two sides of the spreads, leaving the bottom and left edge free to hold without compromising the view of the content.

As with the last issue, a full cover was replaced with the belly band, again using the translucent G. F Smith stock as it was also appropriate to the theme of space and created added cohesion between this issue and the last.