Monthly Review: February

How am I doing generally?

Really good! This month has absolutely FLOWN by as we have all been so busy. But I am managing everything well as well as enjoying projects that I'm working on.

What am I proud of?

Our 'Life's a Pitch' presentation went surprisingly well, in fact it couldn't have gone better really! I'm really proud of the fact that my group and I were literally like chalk and cheese x 4, all having different personalities and different interests, yet we still managed to work really well as a team and come up with a strong business proposal and presentation.

I'm also proud of my team (marketing) of how professionally we promoted our exhibition at Colours May Vary, and the opening night was really successful. I had the responsibility of taking the photographs for the night which I was absolutely bricking it about, but once I got into the swing of it I managed to get some good images that captured the atmosphere of the evening and (hopefully) encouraged people to visit the exhibition by posting and sharing on the Facebook page.
From an individual point of view, I wasn't too happy with my print. I think it was really difficult to produce a print to potentially sell that was so niche and specific to our chosen author. I guess the whole point of the exhibition was to showcase our work, but lets face it, no one is going to want to buy a print about Tourette's Syndrome are they? But never mind! The whole experience has been invaluable!

I've recently started working for the Young Creatives strand of student ambassadors, which has been great so far! This month I have participated in assisting leading a screen print, and an animation workshop which have both been so valuable. I was so pleased that I was able to share my knowledge of screen printing with the students on the Children's Art School programme; I taught one of the girls how to do a split fountain like I did for 504! I really hope to be able to lead illustrative workshops as part of my practice when I graduate as I love meeting and working with new people and sharing creative processes and techniques with them.

(I have the permission of this student to post these pictures on my blog!) 

One more thing; I am so pleased with my grade for 504, I miraculously managed to get 62%! I know every module I desperately try and aim to get a first because I have never got one before, but considering how shit I felt at the end of last year, and having taken every ounce of energy I had to drag myself in and complete this project, I think it was pretty good going!

What am I struggling with?

I'm pretty stressed about responsive, I seem to be spending all of my time on Emil and the Detectives, and it is taking forever! I'm worried that I won't have time to complete the others. Nevertheless,  the group collaborative project is going really well thank goodness, and I have completed Illustration Friday now, so it's not as if I'm not making any process.

COP is slowly getting there... we recently had a task to make five hotdog books to gain an idea about what to produce for our publication, which was actually really helpful and has inspired me to get back into the swing of things.

Other relevant things to mention

The day at Crofton Academy wasn't really what I expected, unfortunately. I thought I'd be shadowing an art teacher all day and working within the art department of the school, but instead I was assisting with a year nine careers day. It was still really useful though! The kids had really open minds in terms of career interests, which was really refreshing to see such a high level of ambition. 
The whole day was actually really useful in hindsight, especially in relation to my ideas for 505 (I'm thinking of creating a workshop pack for schools on issues that need more awareness). I learnt that sitting a bunch of pre-pubescent teens in the same, sweaty room for a whole day and dictating important information at them, maybe isn't the best way to grab their attention.
It is often the important lessons that kids find 'boring', so for example life lessons such as what to do when school finishes, managing money, social groups etc, because the lessons just aren't really that fun. I definitely think the students would benefit a lot more from lessons and days such as these if they were to be delivered in a more creative and vocational way, for example through physical/creative activity etc. So this is something I can reflect upon in 505.

Upcoming Events/Opportunities/Deadlines

There are so many things coming up in March, I don't know whether I should be excited incredibly nervous?!

• 1st: My friend Molly is a student teacher at the minute and she has asked me to do some illustration work with her class tomorrow, I cannot wait! This will be a perfect opportunity to try out some of my ideas for 505 with a much younger age group, and will also build my confidence with teaching.
• 2nd: Secret 7 deadline: I've completed 4/7 album sleeves so far which I'm really happy with, but I'm only submitting this as a quick brief, so not sure if I will complete all seven
• 9th: Penguin Design Award deadline: ~Currently going grey over this so I'll just say that I need to get a serious wiggle on~
• ELCAF and Anorak talks/briefs
• So many other things that I can't even think of off the top of my head

Plan of Action

• Keep reflecting and working hard on ideas for 505, they will probably change a lot in the next month
• Get the book covers done!
• Don't overwhelm myself with things to do
• Urgently get a wiggle on with Secret7
• Go to some galleries, haven't been to any in a while!

Oliver Jeffers

For 505, I'm currently exploring illustrators who produce publications for educational purposes, or with an educational element to them. Having recently discovered the work of Peter Goes, my interest in creatives who have a really broad practice is growing significantly, especially as I am currently unsure of what kind of illustrative route I would like to become my sort of speciality.

I have come across the work of Oliver Jeffers many times before, first noticing his book picture book 'The Day the Crayons Quit' in the gallery shop at the Nottingham Contemporary. The book was hilarious! It really stuck in my mind, you know like how you remember those picture books that really tickle you, or inspire you in some way. It wasn't until I researched his website that I realised what a versatile and immensely talented artist Jeffers happens to be. His portfolio is bursting with years worth of different projects produced in a whole range of media; this really inspires be because I am drawn to illustrators who do not limit themselves and have the ability to completely go crazy and explore and express in visual ways rather than restricting themselves to a tight and limited style. Although that is not always a bad thing! 

I also adore Jeffers' level of enthusiasm. He seems to be so busy engaging in commissions as well as delving into his own self-driven projects, which I believe is really important as an illustrator (and yes this probably sounds really hypocritical because I don't do this enough myself) but yeah I'm assuming that it is a good way of keeping grounded and sane by expressing your own personal interests too. I'm a huge fan of Jeffers' work, and will continue to reference him and use his practice as motivation for the future.

Oliver Jeffers Author Film 2013 from Oliver Jeffers on Vimeo.

Peter Goes

Today whilst engaging in my most guilty pleasure past time(spending ages reading children's books in Waterstones) I came across possibly the most AMAZING picture book I've ever read.

It was called 'Timeline', illustrated by Belgian practitioner, Peter Goes, which tells a visual story of the whole of the earth's existence, from the big bang all the way up to today in a beautifully crafted document. You could literally learn so many things by looking at this book, and I'd argue that it would be more useful than a history GCSE textbook!

Timeline explores every period in history in immense illustrative detail, including famous milestones, monarchs, and just everything important that has ever happened in the existence of planet Earth. I know that is really vague but I can't explain it in any other way. I especially love the intricate attention to detail in terms of narrative, and the way that the information is displayed in a double page spread 'mural' sort of layout, using a restrictive colour palette, which gives it a much higher quality finish. As well, it can be appreciated by any age group, old or young with a really strong educational purpose.

Having researched his website, I noticed that Goes doesn't practice within a really restrictive 'style', and that his tone of voice is relatively broad in terms of imagery and context. For example his work exists among a range of categories such as children's books, prints and t-shirt designs, editorial illustrations for the WHO, banners and logos, greetings cards etc., which really reinforces my faith in wanting to be an adaptable practitioner, rather than being restricted to working in one format.

Colours May Vary: 'Off the Page' Opening Night

Last night was the private view for 'Off the Page', which was a great success! The venue looked so professional which was reflected by the hard work we had collectively grafted into our prints and publications, as well as all of the teams that helped to organise putting everything together.

I was in charge of taking the photos for the night, which I was really nervous about to start with, but once I got into the swing of things, I captured a combination of natural looking images as well as a few line-ups (I felt a little bit like a nightclub photographer!)

In summary, last night was a huge milestone for us all as it gave us a sense of what it is actually like to expose our work to the public and not just post it on our blogs. I'm looking forward to partaking in future events like these as my practice develops.

Colours May Vary: Further Preparations

Marketing

We booked a print slot for 2pm on Wednesday to print out all of our posters and fliers, but on Tuesday night we were all having an absolute melt down about the poster design... We were all exhausted after a long day of being briefed on our new module and using extensive quantities of brain power, that we spent about two and a half hours debating between the colour yellow and half tones- what a nightmare! Miraculously, the print outs looked great (phew)and we decided to use both Amy and Chay's photographs on a mixture of yellow and white paper. 

As well as the prints, Molly and Amber have started up a few social media accounts with posts advertising our show with snippets of our work as little sneak previews. Everything is coming together nicely! All we need to do now is distribute the leaflets to all of the places on the list, and send round e-mails to those we wish to invite to the private viewing.

Print Preparation

We spent this afternoon framing and packaging our prints, which took longer than expected due to cellophane being extremely fiddly! It is really exciting seeing everything being pulled together for the exhibition, it all looks so professional and well presented. I was a little worried that I don't have a business card prepared, and don't want to rush making one that isn't of a high quality before the show, so I just made some back labels displaying my name, details and information about the print. I used the same colour gradient as I have in my prints, so that it ties together and looks smart and presentable.

Life's a Pitch: Presentation Evaluation

Presentation Slides

Last minute preparations

We had a few practice runs this morning before the presentation, and we added a few extra parts to our script to make it more entertaining and 'tongue and cheek', but still on a professional level. We did about six practice runs, but in the initial ones we struggled to get the time above four minutes! This was slightly worrying, but we may have been speaking more quickly due to being nervous. 

How did it go?

The presentation was a complete success, we somehow miraculously managed to bump it up to ten minutes AND entertain the audience at the same time! We all showed a great level of enthusiasm about the potential for Visuwallise which really impressed the tutors and the audience. Personally I felt that Tom and Amber were the most confident at presenting, Amber has such good presentation skills and added so much humour to the pitch, whereas George and I were slightly more reserved. Personally I think this was because I haven't had any practice at presenting since last May so came across as being a little rusty. Overall, I think we delivered the concept of Visuwallise very accurately, professionally showing a lot of personality and individual enthusiasm.

Feedback

We had both positive and negative comments in our feedback, the most negative being the method and percentages of payment, with a lot of people seeing it as unfair that Tom was paid more as CEO than us artists. This does make sense. The initial reason we decided that Tom gets 40% is because that is generally how self employed businesses operate in terms of percentages, however in hindsight, it does seem a little unfair that Tom will be earning more in say admin fees for example than us labourers would after spending weeks and potentially months putting together large scale designs as well as crafting them by hand. So reflectively, it probably would have worked better if we were to receive an equal amount of 25% each.

Another slightly negative comment was that some members of the audience said that we had misused the term 'collective', with the same situation as Tom earning more than George, Amber and I. A collective is an organisation where everyone puts in an equal contribution and is paid equally too. 

However, we did receive some positive feedback that included having a confident front, enthusiastic approach and not limiting ourselves with our ambitions. People said that the idea also had a lot of scope, and there was a gap in the market for this kind of business to enter and flourish in.

Evaluation

I am so proud of what we have achieved as a group, especially as we all have different interests and characteristics, it was a great idea to play this to our strengths. We were very organised and driven to deliver a presentation that really connected with the audience, as well as keeping success in mind and considering who our target market was and how we were going to promote our service. The whole thing felt very realistic and has given me, and all of us an insight into the methods and processes required to set up a creative collaborative business, which is always a possibility for the future. On a personal level, I have discovered an area of interest that I am beginning to become really passionate about. Illustration in the context of educating and healing is something that I wish to further explore in future projects, and can see myself becoming involved with creative organisations in the profession of care a few years down the line.
It has been a great opportunity to collaborate with George, Amber and Tom and work together and individually to create 'Visuwallise', and we will each take away valuable lessons learned from this experience.