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Antonyspiteri|
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01. Who am I? 02. What was the sudden realisation that changed you as an individual? 03. What opportunites have come your way this year? 04. What exhibitions have inspired you? 05. What have you been reading/watching and what have you realised? 06. What are the hopes and fears for after universary? 07. Do you think that it is all about the product? 08. Why do you feel that things needs to be juxtaposed? 09. How would you call yourself? 010. How would you describe the change between first, second and third year? 002
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WHO AM I? 003
Antony Spiteri JOURNAL
I think that this is the main question to ask! I am a graphic artist that has an interest in making publications and voicing a specific message to an audience. As I have a passion for listening to music, I always try to take inspiration from the music that I listen to every day to embed it through my process. This can include the narrative/ feeling’s I have towards a track. Some people might say that music is linear but to me, I feel it is quite the opposite. We all experience a piece of music differently and have our own unique personal response/ journey. I always try to make an unconventional product for a person to look at the product and question what the content would be inside. 004
JOURNAL Currently, I am working on an audio magazine as I love creating publications/ layout designing. I thought that it would be a great idea to be unconventional, breaking the boundaries to create a publication that would create this experience of listening to a narrative behind the track. Using my skill’s for a layout to explain the narrative of the audio recordings for each city’s edition’s narrative to explain this theme of journey. I am utilising my layout, collage, film photography and my own interest in my music skills to develop them further. As I have a passion for listening to music, I knew that it was prominent to incorporate my drive for listening to music and create the artwork/ packaging for the LP record/ cassette tape/ cd.
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I do believe that when I do leave university I need to specialise in the skill I love the most. I have a passion for making collage’s, using this idea of juxtaposing two different narratives in my work. The reason for this is because it gives both sides of a narrative. Trying to remain unbiased and equal. I love incorporating things being manipulated within my work to show my personal response as an artist. My response voices how I was manipulated when I was younger to have these different expectations of growing up but yes I did identify and embrace being gay. Now I look at my work, and I realise that I try not to make a judgement on a person on how they are. I have learnt from writing my dissertation that everybody has a right to speak and share their opinion. Whether they accept being gay or not or having an interest that is seen voices equality is the creation I love making. I believe that design should evoke the individual to listen to the design to sway this change and try and educate another individual in the correct way. I always try to push an open concept and never restrict my ideas. I embrace my every day and want to show a glimpse of my every day to a specific concept that I feel needs a voice.
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I do feel that in university I am showing a range of different things. Utilising the facilities to show a range of different techniques to develop my concept further. I have realised that I am in an institution that has all these different facilities and I am learning to make use of my surroundings/ being engaged with the resources that I have and create something unconventional and unique. For example, reflecting on the last term I experimented with the letterpress/ bookbinding/ riso printing/ laser cutting/ using the wide format printers for the first time. I just embrace the educational learning curve and try and incorporate trying something out to discover something new. Everything definitely has a reason behind it, so I question everything because I embrace being a curious individual. This is the role that I push forward in my work, and question the development/ the process of an idea to grow further. Some people might critic that my work is only publication and music packaging, but I know my interests more than anybody else. I brush it under the carpet and just tell myself that within the two things I love there are so many different alternatives to making something new. I will keep my interest’s but I will be unconventional when designing.
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From a young age, I have always dreamt of having my own freelance studio. This ambition will always remain in my heart. Within 5 years wherever I will be, I will one day have this for definite. I love doing things for myself! Reflecting back on my university experience, I give myself a lot of credit coming from a family that doesn’t have much knowledge in design. I feel that I have learnt a range of different things and know that having the correct attitude when making something shows the journey of a design to be more fluid. I finished college with an incomplete A level in art, but I knew that I could still go and embrace this new experience and be educated by people who have worked in the industry. I took this opportunity and just embraced the new daily learning experiences.
WHAT WAS THE SUDDEN REALISATION THAT CHANGED YOU AS AN INDIVIDUAL?
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This might be dark to start with but remaining real and being open about my everyday remains important to me. I also feel that it is nice to address my experience and see how I had dealt with it to inspire others that life still continues. At the beginning of the year I had the experience of being mugged and had my dissertation/ laptop/ hard drive stolen of me that had my portfolio and all my files saved on. I am not wanting any sympathy. As an individual, I never dwell on the past. I have learnt that within the everyday there’s always a reason for somebody doing something and I just accept it. We all have issues and as a designer my voice is to try and promote the correct attitude and show change within society. My attitude at the moment is just remaining current and having this attitude makes people interested on subjects that are new to myself as a graphic artist. From this negative experience, I have realised that materials are materials and things can always be replaced! When this happened to me, I knew that I couldn’t have a negative attitude because if I did it would affect my work. I worked so hard and utilised the tools that I had around me and made a unique outcome of a publication. I thought that from this experience I wanted to push and prove how real I was within my work. I made my self-destruction publication which showed my passion on who I was as a designer. As the experience of being mugged happened on my street, I was not going to let two individuals change my life for the worst. If more I wanted to change for the best.
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Therefore, I got myself up and engaged with my surroundings. I took my film camera, bought myself a couple of film rolls and instantly went out to the ‘Canal Street’ in Gay Village and captured my own identity. This changed me as an individual because I was out and embracing who I was. This gave me the realisation that nobody knows me better than myself. When creating this self-destruction publication, I knew that I had to self-destruct from those insecurities and just remain real to who I was. I don’t wish for this experience to happen to anybody because it was a traumatic experience of life/ death. Looking back at it though it has changed me as an individual and has pushed me to always remain true to however you identify. A turning point for the creation of selfdestruction was originally about the LGBT community, voicing out remaining authentic to your identity and showing the statistics of the LGBT hate crime within the UK. I took this attitude of my experience and just wanted to present a publication of being open/ authentic and staying true. Showing the journey from destructing from your inauthentic self to your authentic true self. As it was a personal response of being open, I still wanted it to be formative and educating people with how the community is treated in our current society. As much as I love educating myself, I do have to admit I love educating others for their own self-growth and development.
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TARGET:// LGBTQ
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During the time of creating my self-destruction publication, I had the perfect opportunity with one of my favourite graphic artist. Patrick Thomas was scheduled to come in on the 20th February and I had a massive interest in his work from viewing his Berlin-based studio work on Instagram. I felt that it was essential to remain real and engage with different new opportunities. I spoke to Hitch and mentioned my love for his work and he signed me up for his workshop. Patrick’s workshop consisted of creating a publication that was open to creating a publication that had a topic that was within the 500m radius of the Art School. As I had completed the self-destruction publication I just submitted it and reprinted a couple of copies to pass on to his students in Stuttgart, Germany. What I have learnt from the experience of taking part of this workshop was that there is no harm in participating in something that you have an interest within. I have learnt that I shouldn’t put my guard up and should just prove that I can engage with somebody to talk about my work. The main thing I have realised this year is that I have to continue with this networking and getting people involved in my work. Getting the contacts, and speaking to different people in my field of practice only benefits and pushes the response of my work. When I was in his workshop, I took every piece of critic which made me realise that I can make the product develop further. Patrick Thomas workshop gave me the realisation that I needed to be out there and not be afraid of the judgement of creating something. Having out of the box concepts that I try to come up with only make something different. I hate looking at something and seeing that it is similar to something else. I love being fearless in my work to show that within design you can literally create anything if it has meaning and a narrative behind it. In his workshop, it made me also understand that when creating something to always create it with multiple copies and just pass them around to people you love, people you hate and everything in-between.
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WHAT OPPORTUNITIES HAS COME YOUR WAY THIS YEAR?
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PATRICK THOMAS LECTURE
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At the beginning of the year one of my aspirations was to put on an exhibition or be a part of an exhibition. During March an opportunity came across me where there was an artist calling to submit anything I was working on to inspire other creatives. The exhibition was called ‘Art on the Sly’ and its mission was to create a night of appreciation, pride and to build a creative community. The exhibition was in support for a company called Love C.O.P’s which are a squatting crew dedicated to hosting and co-producing inclusive, community – centred events. As a creative living in Manchester, within my every day I walk around people who are homeless and haven’t got anything. I knew that I wanted to participate in this opportunity and show my work and voice that you can create anything with any material. Even if it is something that you pick up on the floor. The beauty of art is that we are living in it and it surrounds us. During this exhibition, I tried to limit my components to give this sense of not having too many things. In the work, I submitted I was in the stage of doing some spray paint experiments where I was just trying out different visuals to see how I could apply it to my work. I didn’t let it restrict to me because it was experimentation. I wanted to receive feedback and critic on the experiments to see where there was room for improvement. As I am a person who tries to always push a person to remain true to who they are, I also submitted about 200 riso prints that represent being individual and embracing your own identity with whatever problem you may have occurred in your life.
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Antony Spiteri My attitude is not for the money, my attitude for is for making a people engaged. I left every single print I printed and donated every single piece of design for the reason to push and inspire others who don’t have much to feel loved and welcome in the industry of design. During this exhibition, I realised that I love making people feeling uplifted and making people realise that change is good and that we are on this journey of life that constantly goes up and down. It’s about remaining active, engaging a change for a person’s belief and remaining true to making what you love.
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Another opportunity that I had over Easter was that an international magazine reached out to me over Instagram and asked me to submit my spray paint experiments. This was the first time a magazine had reached out to me to ask to submit my work within the publication. I knew that I couldn’t just let this opportunity go, so I refined and edited the work, submitted everything to their size dimensions. From this experience ‘1340gallery’ magazine made me write an artist statement which made me think about who I was. It reflected on my passion and made me refine my skills in a couple of sentences. I found that this was important because as a graphic artist I should always be able to refine what I design and what interest’s I have in a couple of sentences. I have learnt that in life people like to listen to something that is something short and simple and to the point and not being too over complicated. Reflecting back to last year and how I made thing’s I always tried to make something that was so overcomplicated that wouldn’t show a clear narrative from start to finish. This learning curve of being consistent and relevant to your concept makes me reflect and look back on what my purpose is of the concept. What am I trying to say? This month I am creating a club event with a couple of my course-mates – Nina Machin, James Dickinson and Wakil Ahmed. My role was to design all the artwork for the event and have the freedom of making anything to draw the attention of people to come and view the fundraiser event. With the artwork, I took inspiration from my love of using fluro colours. Taking inspiration from using the riso printer in my self-destruction project I loved how riso printing made a drastic stand out when you printed the design. As a group, we decided that we would base our idea on fluro colours and name ourselves FLURO. As a person who loves going out in my free time, I have realised that when you go out thing’s need to draw the audience attention. My initial idea was to question what people love seeing so I created a moving gif that would draw the attention of students seeing different flashing colours of fluro to draw them into the night. 023
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Entire FLURO artwork designed by Antony Spiteri A3/A6 Flyers - Cover Photo 026
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Over the duration of this year, I have tried to engage myself in visiting a range of different exhibitions. I have realised that being engaged and seeing what is out there in the creative industry is important for your own self-growth. I have realised that visiting exhibitions can show a range of current and traditional art. I take inspiration from anything but an exhibition explains a story to an audience which shows different art pieces to build upon a specific narrative. I feel that in itself needs to be considered when you are creating something. During the Art on the Sly exhibition, it made me realise that I need to consider other people’s concepts to appreciate my work remaining authentic and true to my concept.
WHAT EXHIBITIONS HAVE INSPIRED YOU?
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BASQUIAT- BOOM FOR REAL (BARBICAN, LONDON)
In January, my best friend came back from Japan for the Christmas holidays and reached out to me mentioning the exhibition Basquiat- Boom for Real. This exhibition was at Barbican in London where she mentioned that his work was all about street art/ graffiti. As I knew that I was wanting to create a publication that was about the street’s I needed to engage myself and educate myself on existing art out there. When I did my initial research on Basquiat I realised that his entire work was Xerox art. Xerography involves using a photocopier to create the artwork. Before I went to this exhibition I had no idea what Xerox art was. People still to this day have a stigma with graffiti and think that it’s a cliché. I still find the beauty of it, I find it so raw and make’s a city have character. Imagine a city without any graffiti in. Boring. I find the attitude of graffiti artists is constantly trying to break the rules of
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being conventional. The graffiti artist has the pressure of being caught and being arrested if found. Within his exhibition, I realised that Jean Michael Basquiat was similar to me in a way that he took his inspiration on what was going on in his every day and would just make anything out of it. This idea of not having any limitation. Creating Xerox art gave his work a sense of the thing’s being manipulated and altered. Before this exhibition, I knew that I loved manipulation but I didn’t try to include it within each project because I thought that it would be too repetitive. Visiting this exhibition made me realise that I need to incorporate an artist stamp on my work. Reflecting back on the exhibition Jean Michael Basquiat made me realise that it is very important to get authorship of your work. Unfortunately, in this world, there are people that try to claim something that isn’t there’s. I always want to show that I was the graphic artist that came up with my concept. A quote from Suzanne (Basquiat’s girlfriend) that stuck by me was that ‘Basquiat’s favourite punctuation, a copyright sign.’
TATE, LIVERPOOL - MARY REID KELLY AND PATRICK KELLY During March, I took a visit to the Tate Modern in Liverpool which exhibited a range of different creatives work. One artist that really inspired me and pushed my growth was Mary Reid Kelly and Patrick Kelly – We are Ghosts. The exhibition was a combination of painting, performance and poetry to invite us to think again about the ways we write history. I took inspiration from how they incorporated video to present their work and talk about the different ghost stories, they reimagine fictional and historical accounts using elaborate wordplay and a distinctly artificial visual language. I am a graphic artist that loves being current but I do definitely see it important to respect the
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history of something. Whether it is an experience, listening to different experiences creates a sense of range through a piece of work. Visiting this exhibition made me realise how important it is to listen to different experiences because people can hear a different perception of something - where people can relate to in a sense.
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Well personally, I have been reading a range of different things. As a designer, I feel that it is fundamental that I engage myself with the latest trends and see what is current. Being engaged with reading/ watching new things makes me as an artist current with what is existing in society. From my experience of the beginning of the year having my hard drive stolen of me made me realise that I don’t need to just have the past. It’s nice to look back sometimes but it gave me the realisation that I have to be current with everything I do and realise that the best work will come from being current and different than other designers.
My latest book read was over Easter where I read the memoir of Jean Michael Basquiat and it really gave me a glimpse of his passion and drive for making things. Reading this book has made me realise that I don’t need to rely on people to create my own things happen. If I want to create something, I should do it for myself and just embrace discovering things constantly. One lesson that I have learnt is that if you don’t fail I can’t succeed. I have embraced failing and I can reflect on how during my first hand in I got my lowest mark in university gaining a mark of 52. This didn’t make me feel like a failure it gave me the chance that there is always room for improvement. If you want something so bad, I have learnt
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that you need to put yourself first and just make the thing that you want to create happen. Being selfish for your own growth should never be looked down upon because I have realised that this is the time and the age that I need to put myself first to push myself for the unpredictable future. If it doesn’t work I have discovered that there is always room for an alternative and change. The beauty of design is that an idea is constantly evolving and changing, so accepting this change takes a lot of stress down in the process of the project. From reading the memoir of Jean Michael Basquiat I have taken inspiration on how active a person can be. My interpretation of my every day is about being out every single day, getting recognition for the hard work that I put in and trying to make this sense of change when a person reads and perceives my work. I have also learnt from reading the memoir of Jean Michael Basquiat that I should never get attached to the process of making something and get attached to the outcome of the product. An idea and the creative process will develop constantly so why get attached to one specific thing when you can create a range of different things and be proud of the final outcome. As I am dyslexic, I do sometimes struggle with reading so many pages but I will never let my ability get the better of me. I have learnt from my Relief Records project at the beginning of the year that there is always room for improvement and from practice and doing something the idea will constantly develop. As I have a huge interest in watching different videos to inspire me, I utilise the different tools that are out there like Vimeo/ YouTube/ Behance. In my current project, I have to gather inspiration from my music interests. I like to listen to different music artist and gaining inspiration from their music to sample and create my own narrative form. Some people might think that sampling somebody’s work isn’t authentic and I do recognise that it’s not authentic when you sample and receive the sound. As a graphic artist, it
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is my role to change and manipulate my every day into the vision that I see. When altering the sound, it makes a completely different narrative and then this is when I realise that it is new, contemporary and authentic. As a designer, what better way to utilise the internet to watch different videos to educate myself on how different artists show their process. I have also realised that when viewing somebody’s work that I need to be constantly critiquing it and analysing how they did something and start understanding the meaning behind the product. A publication that I have been watching these last couple of months is the 411VM magazine which is a video skate magazine, which shows a glimpse of different skateboarders. 411VM (video magazine) have broken the rules of a conventional publication and brought something new to the table. It has made me realise that I don’t need to be so literal and as a designer. My role is to always break boundaries and change the conventions of how somebody might perceive the product.
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Well personally, I have been reading a range of different things. As a designer, I feel that it is fundamental that I engage myself with the latest trends and see what is current. Being engaged with reading/ watching new things makes me as an artist current with what is existing in society. From my experience of the beginning of the year having my hard drive stolen of me made me realise that I don’t need to just have the past. It’s nice to look back sometimes but it gave me the realisation that I have to be current with everything I do and realise that the best work will come from being current and different than other designers.
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My latest book read was over Easter where I read the memoir of Jean Michael Basquiat and it really gave me a glimpse of his passion and drive for making things. Reading this book has made me realise that I don’t need to rely on people to create my own things happen. If I want to create something, I should do it for myself and just embrace discovering things constantly. One lesson that I have learnt is that if you don’t fail I can’t succeed. I have embraced failing and I can reflect on how during my first hand in I got my lowest mark in university gaining a mark of 52. This didn’t make me feel like a failure it gave me the chance that there is always room for improvement. If you want something so bad, I have learnt that you need to put yourself first and just make the thing that you want to create happen. Being selfish for your own growth should never be looked down upon because I have realised that this is the time and the age that I need to put myself first to push myself for the unpredictable future. If it doesn’t work I have discovered that there is always room for an alternative and change. The beauty of design is that an idea is constantly evolving and changing, so accepting this change takes a lot of stress down in the process of the project. From
reading the memoir of Jean Michael Basquiat I have taken inspiration on how active a person can be. My interpretation of my every day is about being out every single day, getting recognition for the hard work that I put in and trying to make this sense of change when a person reads and perceives my work. I have also learnt from reading the memoir of Jean Michael Basquiat that I should never get attached to the process of making something and get attached to the outcome of the product. An idea and the creative process will develop constantly so why get attached to one specific thing when you can create a range of different things and be proud of the final outcome.
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As I am dyslexic, I do sometimes struggle with reading so many pages but I will never let my ability get the better of me. I have learnt from my Relief Records project at the beginning of the year that there is always room for improvement and from practice and doing something the idea will constantly develop. As I have a huge interest in watching different videos to inspire me, I utilise the different tools that are out there like Vimeo/ YouTube/ Behance. In my current project, I have to gather inspiration from my music interests. I like to listen to different music artist and gaining inspiration from their music to sample and create my own narrative form. Some people might think that sampling somebody’s work isn’t authentic and I do recognise that it’s not authentic when you sample and receive the sound. As a graphic artist, it is my role to change and manipulate my every day into the vision that I see. When altering the sound, it makes a completely different narrative and then this is when I realise that it is new, contemporary and authentic. As a designer, what better way to utilise the internet to watch different videos to educate myself on how different artists show their process. I have also realised that when viewing somebody’s work that I need to be constantly critiquing it and analysing how they did something and start understanding the meaning behind the product. A publication that I have been watching these last couple of months is the 411VM magazine which is a video skate magazine, which shows a glimpse of different skateboarders. 411VM (video magazine) have broken the rules of a conventional publication and brought something new to the table. It has made me realise that I don’t need to be so literal and as a designer. My role is to always break boundaries and change the conventions of how somebody might perceive the product.
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WHAT ARE THE HOPES AND FEARS FOR AFTER UNIVERSITY? 041
Taking inspiration from Ian Swifty’s workshop I have learnt it is important to completely wing life day by day. I know that within life we all have these unexpected situations so I try not to be overly ambitious when planning. I am not disregarding being ambitious because having a drive is what pushes you further to develop a concept. As I went travelling to India in the summer of 2017 it gave me a glimpse that you can just take day by day and see what opportunities come your way. Along with having the experience of being mugged made me realise that I can incorporate my surroundings that I have and create a narrative with my existing objects. As a designer, I always feel that I need to control and have the correct attitude when designing a specific brief. I have to listen to myself and question what the audience would want and put myself almost in their shoes and see if they would consume the product. I do believe that it is important to engage and always look for different opportunities. Being aware of what the real world has to offer is very important, especially coming to an end of finishing this degree. Over my three years in university, I have realised that a successful design needs to show balance. I am going to take this attitude of balancing things out and incorporate it into my every day after I finish with university. Balancing my working hours with my design hours. I know that I can’t be overly too ambitious because currently, I am paying for the range of different facilities that I always try to utilise in my different projects. When university will be over there is an element of fear in the back of my mind but I always look past it and know that there will be a route that I discover to owning my own studio! My fears for leaving university is not having any facilities, being low on money and trying to fund myself in Manchester along with funding a career in design. I know that life is not easy, so my solution is that 2018-2019 will be the year of work. The year of determination, the drive to do long hours, work in a shitty job that I might not like but try and save enough to gain my own riso printer. I have always wanted to have a riso printer because I love how authentic it makes the design come out when printed.
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DO YOU THINK THAT IT IS ALL ABOUT THE PRODUCT?
Now I might be contradicting myself to my last question but this is difficult for me to answer. I’d like to think that it wasn’t just about the product. In my morals I have to put a person first before anything. Remaining real and true to how I perceive things is what makes me an artist. Materials are just materials. They come and go but I feel that a good product should voice a message of change when you purchase it. The beauty of design is that you can create a message from anything and can be inspired by the surroundings. When receiving feedback from a person I love hearing what people have to think of it to gain a response. I like to get this response to work with so I can see what the consumer and the audience wants. Once I gather this information, I like to create a social change and have the right to give my opinion within society; like everybody else should be. Writing my dissertation and focusing on remaining authentic and respecting a person’s right to have an opinion made me realise that
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it’s not just about consuming things. I have discovered that it is essential to listen. Without listening, where is the change? How is a product going to have an impact on somebody if you are not respectful? Being respectful and understanding what people want, only pushes me to communicate something that I believe is right. I know that we live in this society that people have occurring disagreements but knowing that I’ve tried listening and researching within a topic to grasp an issue can make an impact of things being different, which gives me as an artist a sense of reward when designing something. My opinion stands that I want to make people feel uplifted and show that my design has had the impact on changing on what people have pre perception on an issue. An example of this can be within my last two projects. When creating my self destruction zine I wanted to uplift individuals that feel that they might identify different. I showed this balance of the community and tried to educate people within the community and people that didn’t identify LGBT.
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WHY DO YOU FEEL LIKE THINGS NEED TO BE JUXTAPOSED? In my university experience, I feel that over the three years my general attitude has changed drastically. When talking to family and friends and when issues to arise I now realise that you should always hear both sides to an argument. I have realised this idea of juxtaposing things can connote two sides of a point. I have realised that being authentic to what you believe only steers you in the right direction. I find this beauty of individualism when you listen to both sides of a story. You can hear two different opinions. My job I guess as a graphic artist is that I have to be the person in-between. Trying to gather all this different opinions to try and juxtapose and place them together. In life, I do believe that either somebody is going to like your work or not. So why not embrace both and just create something from two contrasting points.
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HOW WOULD YOU DESCRIBE THE CHANGE BETWEEN FIRST, SECOND AND THIRD YEAR? 047
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Well, looking over the duration of the three years it is crazy how different each year has been. I have felt that over the three years I have learnt so much about myself that I thought that I would never learn. I didn’t know what to expect when arriving at university on my first day. For example, coming out of college without finishing my A Level in Art and Design made me have a little bit of doubt that I am going to be a shitty designer. I look back at it now and think, how could I have been so naive and thought that of myself. Honestly, at the beginning of first year I did think that I was not going to reach the expectations of the course. On the other hands, I really respect the course for taking it easy the first year and just educating us the basic rules within design. Speaking to some course mates, they did mention that first year was just pointless because it was about thing’s they had already learnt in design college. As for me though, I have a reason for appreciating the teaching. First year was an eye-opening year and taught me the foundation of the different terminology and understanding the programs. I came from a college that didn’t have any software so I had to self-teach myself through trial and error. I was the only person in my college that had an interest in graphic design and my college, unfortunately, didn’t supply the facilities. Reflecting back to first year I remember being the quiet one but always tried to speak to a tutor and teach me how to use a program. I learnt through first year to just have fun, it was a year of just educating myself on the basic factors of graphic design.
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I do feel though that second year on the course was a bit forced. I am not trying to slate the programme, but I do feel that the course was trying to restrict us a bit on how open we wanted to design. I did feel that through second year I was trying to come up with some unconventional ideas but tutors did mention to me that it was overcomplicated and that I had to limit myself in making something more simple like a tote bag/ poster for the Topman project. For me I always knew that if I was going to make something, I was going to go full swings and try show my talent. I might be biased saying this and I really don’t want a critic to justify the course but my experience in second year was that I did have a sense of restriction in doing the things I loved. I can look back now and understand a bit why the course might have done that in a way to make it accessible to different students that might have an interest in refining their work, but I do feel that the course should always promote this idea of being unconventional and making something unseen. We all know how to create a poster but it is showing a range of different outcomes. Reflecting on what I did learn through second year was that it was important for a concept to always have a purpose and to always focus on an audience. I do feel that in second year I also had to focus on my initial idea. If I had come up with an idea, I found myself sticking to the one idea to develop but what I have now learnt is that I should never get attached to the first initial idea and get attached to the outcome instead.
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This is where I have educated myself in third year and discovered that a great idea should come naturally. If I force myself on keeping to my original idea, I will be limiting myself as a designer. I take inspiration from my initial thoughts but why should I hold up on my first thought. This is why in third year I have discovered that I should just embrace the journey, and not get attached on the to the process and just enjoy and have fun on the journey and see my concept develop gradually. I would hate to force an idea because to me a forced idea can be seen clearly to creatives that it is not thought out properly. Now all the doubts and things I couldn’t do in my first and second year of university I just give it a fuck it attitude and know if I am feeling content and I am liking my process then why not pursue it? One thing I am realising through this program is that you need to be at ore with what you are making so it can not only have an impact on the audience but to have an impact on yourself. For me, I rather make something that breaks the boundaries of design and gain a sense of achievement with an outcome that I love rather than feeling just a small satisfaction of completing a design. 050
JOURNAL
Well after taking a visit to Liverpool, I have discovered that I don’t really need to refine my self. I do like to call myself a graphic artist because I don’t want to just specialise in graphics. After having a long conversation to a visual artist on the street spray painting he explained that if I don’t like refining myself in just doing graphic design; I am better off calling myself as a visual artist. He explained that a visual artist just wants to get engaged in different things and show the range of skills that an individual has. Having no limitations and just doing different opportunities that come my way. I mentioned to him that I am not in it for the money, I am here for the change and to make an impact on people’s life.
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Some people might have an opinion of me mentioning that I am not in it for the money but I’d rather make an impact and charge. Obviously, I am going to have to try and gain an income but I am not like some people that want to charge hundred for a logo. I rather gain the satisfaction and the reward of making my concept come to life.
HOW WOULD YOU CALL YOURSELF?
––Antonyspiteri
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Antonyspiteeri Third Year Journal
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