CONTENTS WHAT AM I DOING? WHY DO I DO IT? LOOK AT ALL THE THINGS I COULD DO THINGS I'VE DONE THAT MAKE ME THINK I CAN DO MORE THINGS ONLINE PRESENCE PYSHICAL PRESENCE COMMUNITY LIVING POW! GOTTA KEEP MOVING
I’m an Illustrator and 3D Artist whose practice, fuelled by an interest in human interaction and British humour, is an exploration of colour, shape and form through sculpture.
My creative identity is also applied to Film Making, Animation and Events Organisation, always keeping the focus on amusing the viewer and spreading At the beginning of third year I positivity and happiness would have considered myself a ‘paper artist’, however as through my work. we have moved through the year I have expanded my use of materials, choosing instead to create a consistent aesthetic across a variety of mediums. This started with a trip to Dorset Scrap Store, which made me aware of all the shapes and additions to my work I could access without having to make them from paper; this not only saved time but added a new ‘plastic’ dimension to my work. This coincided with my decision to learn how to lasercut, which although I was skeptical about it to begin with (‘but isn’t it cheating?’) has taken my work from strength to strength.
Adding spraypaint, vinyl sticker and plenty of acrylic into this mix has taken my practice to a new unexpected place; I’m no longer restricted by materials but empowered by them. This realization has giving me the confidence to create work that can be move, be worn or even be eaten! I hope I can continue to learn new skills that will enhance my work in the future, such as wood and metal working techniques; more abilities just opens up more creative possibilities.
WHAT AM I DOING?
WHY DO I DO IT? I’m inspired by shape, pattern, form and colour. I can find this anywhere from an oddly spaced buiding on a walk around Birmingham to an interesting curtain colour in a pensioners window, I’m not usually hunting for it, but it’s about keeping my eyes open.
It can also appear in my own work presenting itself in a slightly different way, I recently had a surge of inspiration when two of my freshly laser cut patterns arranged themselves nicely on top of each other, creating new patterns and new inspirations for further projects, and that’s really important to me, storing inspiration for future use.
My phone has provided a great way for me to do this, I’m constantly snapping photos of things I see that I like in some way and then they are all stored for me to come back to later.
Sometimes, however, inspiration doesn’t always just walk into your life, so it’s nice to know where you can go to seek it out. Amusement Arcades, The Science Museum and books about machinery have been the biggest aesthetic stimulus during the last year, not only providing details and patterns that can be
replicated in my work but also increasing my understanding of engineered elements and how things function. Seeking aesthetic inspiration from these sources consequently pushed the boundaries of my practice as my ambition became to create work with a playful interactivity through their ability to move.
The initial inspiration for this year’s projects came from a summer spent alone in Bournemouth working in the service industry and having most of my interactions with people being with strangers. It made me aware of how rude individuals can be to people that they don’t know, whether it is their bus driver or to me pouring them a pint. It showed me how amusingly awkward we are around each other, and how humorous human interaction can be for the observer. The summer exposed to me that I was a curtain twitching people watcher, this interest in people has thus become the focus of my work, approaching the subject with my own cynically optimistic view about the way we engage with one another. I aim to aim to change peoples perception of how we interact and make them smile in the process.
What I’ve learnt about illustration in the last year is that it does not always have to limit itself to an image on a page, and illustrators don’t have to limit themselves to just making pictures. I’ve noticed a shift in the people I ‘look up to’ from graphic artists and drawers, to makers, set designers, a n i m a t o r s , art directors, jewellery creators, installation artists and people who encompass all of the above. And this doesn’t mean that people who choose to focus on the production of 2D imagery aren’t real creative, of course they are! But realizing that because that isn’t what I want to do doesn’t stop
LOOK AT ALL THE THINGS I COULD DO me being a ‘real’ illustrator has settled my nerves about entering this industry. I used to worry that I couldn’t focus on producing work that could easily fit an editorial brief or be adapted for a book jacket cover, but accepting that the traditional side of illustration might not necessarily be my ‘niche’ has allowed me to explore all the other avenues for my work. Rosy Nicholas is a prop and accessories maker who also produces prints and she has collaborated for the last 5 seasons on Fred Butlers shoe collection, she
applies her style to multiple disciplines and as a result is very successful. This year I’ve allowed myself to explore set design, animation, film, jewellery, sculpture, installation and a slightly tame attempt at ‘graffiti’ and not concerned myself with trying fit my previously naïve idea of what an illustrator has to be.
ROSY NICHOLAS DOES ALL THE THINGS
During Pre-Major project I produced a window display for FLUX Art Supplies in Bournemouth town centre. This is potentially my favourite experience I’ve had throughout my degree as it was extremely overambitious and, therefore, very successful! I always thought that I would enjoy producing window displays and I’m glad I took the steps to test this rather then just assuming it was an obvious direction for my work.
FLUX
Producing work to draw attention to someone’s shop and have them tell you that they’ve had ‘all sort of people come in to get a closer’ look is a huge confidence boost and I’m hoping that by taking this step I can avoid the paradox of ‘requiring experience to gain experience’ when it comes to applying for future visual merchandising work.
THINGS I'VE DO THINK I CA
ONE THAT MAKE ME AN DO MORE THINGS
After Christmas four other illustrators, a costume student and myself worked together on a brief for Animated Exeter. We were asked to produce a animation or film that would then be projected on buildings down Exeter’s Fore Street. This was a fantastic opportunity not only to learn new skills in Film Making and After Effects editing, but also was our first experience of presenting ourselves to other creatives and the public as professional. Working along
side Bafta award winning Film Maker and Animator Tal Rosner was a brilliant opportunity and we impressed him so much with our ‘hand made’ approach to the brief that we were asked
LIGHTSTREAM AT ANIMATED EXETER
to create an array of installation pieces to accompany our film; a great way to show off more of our skillsets. The addition of a costume/set designer to our team was invaluable in educating me on the working dynamics of people from other creative disciplines, it’s important to respect and try to understand other people’s working process because it won’t always match your own. It’s important to share skills and creative methods with each others as it’s only going to help us push our practice further.
MUDDLED ZINE Due to there being a large group of paper artists in this years graduate class we decided to come together to create a fanzine that showcased this shared love of the material.
We came up with a simple concept of swapping colours and used this as our brief for creating our pieces, using paper and your assigned colour as the only guildline in the making of your work. It was difficult process to act as a group liaison and to get it printed but I personally learnt a lot about communicating with other group members and how to talk to print companies. The Zines have been selling well to raise money for Grad Show and I have a few plans for how we can use them to raise our professional profile in the future.
P c i a y o a J
W s f a o A i T t i
Philip Baliey and I have been avid collaborators since first year so it’s no surprise that we took on another mini collaboration this year, this time enlisting the help of Photographer India Phillips and children’s Fashion Designer Jenna Le Maitre.
We created props and set pieces for a Kids fashion shoot based around the theme of Astronauts vs Aliens that was shot in the New Forest. This experience taught me how important it is to be
able to fix props on the job when a child smashes a cardboard sword into a tree and that small talk is a vital skill when lingering on a photo shoot set; from children to grandparents you have to be able to talk to everyone! This experience was stressful and a massive learning curve but it payed off as the final images are in the process of being published in ‘La Petite’ Magazine; a fantastic opportunity for international exposure with ‘trendy kids’ and potential clients around the world.
ONE SMALL STEP
I MADE IT WITH MY HANDS
‘I made it with my hands’ was an exhibition organized and curated by a group of illustration students at The Factory in Boscombe exhibiting the work of 22 craft enthusiasts.
Philip Bailey, Claire Edwardes, Abby Foord and I chose to work together again in order to produce ‘The Garden Gismo’, a Wallace and Gromit inspired watering can that showcases our craft skills and madness. The private view was a huge success and it was such a great confidents
boost for the London Show to see how a group of students can organise a successful exhibition. This exhibition also reiterated my affection for working with Phil, Claire and Abby and made me realized that this can’t stop when University ends (more on that later).
It is of vital importance in this day and age to be extremely visible on the internet, luckily for me I appear to be the only ‘Kristi Minchin’ in the world at the moment so I’m fairly easy to track down, what I need to focus on, therefore, is making sure when people find me they like what they see. By online presence is built across three main platform; twitter, instagram and my website. In a short chat with Gina Cross I was advised that I should capitalise on social media as it suits my ‘cheeky’ and informal attitude and my work reads well on screen. Twitter is a fantastic way to stay aware of the industry and keep in touch with potential clients. It also allows me to show off my personality without coming across unprofessional. Instagram has been a useful addition to my practice because it allows me a way to document my working process at different stages, particularly useful when I’m working on a more
ONLINE PRESENCE
time consuming project. I try to keep up my bright and colourful aesthetic across all these platforms, showing continuity in my colour palette makes it easy for people to recognize that it’s my profile and my work. However on my website I have decided against having a brightly coloured background as I felt it made the work look unprofessional and tacky. I’ve decided to stick with a white background that the layout came with, I think this allows my website to look like an ‘online gallery’ and keeps the viewers focus on my practice. I’m in a process of compiling a list of e-mail addresses for potentially clients so that I have
a quick way of showing them my work. I intend to have a large variety of people on the list from illustration agencies and newspapers to homeware magazines and independent boutique stores. I hope that by showing my work to as many people as possible it will allow me a variety of platforms to apply my practice too. I’m debating about whether I should create multiple PDF portfolios to showcase different aspects of my practice, this will be decided on once I’ve sent out my first batch of e-mails.
Although I think it will be a vital tool in my career, it’s important not just to just have my work online.
I intend to reach out to a selection of potential clients postgraduation through sending out a series of press packs, consisting of my business card, a postcard of my work and my CV. I’m also arranging a group ‘muddled’ press pack which will consist of a “muddled’ zine and the business cards of everyone in involved in that collaboration. This is a way of gaining attention for 8 peers and myself at once and also has the added benefit of being able to split postage 9ways, ideal for making an impression cheaply, but not a cheap impression!
P
PHYSICAL PRESENCE If any of this effort to catch client’s attention does actually work and leads to a meeting I have a A3 portfolio box to present my work. This is the ideal way to display my work as it allows me to have a mix of high quality photographic prints and smaller scale 3D work. I have
made a display box specifically for my jewellery allowing me to take these pieces to interview easily and due to the depth of the box there is room to add more 3D, if it suits, in the future.
For the last three years I have tried to fully utilize the studio environment that AUB Illustration has to offer. I enjoy working around others and feel I’m at my best when I have people to bounce my idea around with and discuss each other’s work. I have also reveled in the creative community that is the University
and this has driven me to collaborate with photographers, costume designers and make-up artists and discuss my work with fine artists, textiles designers and graphic designers, a.k.a. my friends!
COMMUNITY LIVING
Within illustration I have consistently collaborated with three other students, my best friends Philip Bailey, Abby Foord and Claire Edwardes.
Although I drive them crazy it is obvious we work exceptionally well together and can formulate slightly mental and larger then life ideas when we work as a group. PostFMP we are planning to form a collective, entitled Pie on the Wall (POW!), so we can continue to create installations,
host events and make each other laugh. We have recently entered a competition to decorate a outdoor festival area at the launch of outlook festival and are currently in the process of writing applications for assorted festivals to host workshops including Greenman. Over summer we will collaborate on further project to boost our combined portfolio and work on our branding for Pie on the Wall, such as a collective website.
POW!
Although the future is always uncertain I am confident that I will follow through with my current post-graduation plan, which is to move to Bristol.
I am mostly moving because of this statement that I read on the Metro website, ‘from bars on boats to art galleries in former toilets, there is a thriving independent spirit in the city that gave the world both Banksy and Wallace & Gromit, and even invented Ribena.’
I think that, second only to London, Bristol has been showcasing itself as a fantastic creative hub in the last few years and it’s certainly something that I want to get involved in. I’m originally from Gloucester which as lovely as it is has about as much creative spirit as a sack of potatoes and the idea of returning to my country pub job and working out of my parents dining room fills my with dread. The idea of moving to Bristol however and getting a swanky city pub job and working on my tiny flats living room floor sounds like a great plan! The added incentive of knowing my friends want to move with me and that home is only 40minutes away on the train if the stresses of real life get too much makes it sound like an ideal living situation for someone taking there first steps into the creative industries.
GOTTA KEEP MOVING
Once slightly settled I will look for creative internships and opportunities that I can do along side my part-time job, looking particularly into prop making opportunity as I think these skills could enhance my portfolio. I also plan to get in touch with the two laser cut studios that I am currently aware of in Bristol, Bristol Design Forge and Laser Lab,
about job vacancies or work experience opportunities. Although it’s a bit of a long shot this is an option that is worth exploring as the addition of laser cutting to my working process has strengthened my work so much, it’s important to not remove it from my practice once my degree is over. I am aware that I can always pay to laser cut but at approximately £60 per hour it would be more ideal to create a working relationship with the people who supply this technology.
Although it’ll be sad to leave the seaside it’s time to move on and stretch my creative legs in a new and exciting place. This might end up being the worse decision I’ve ever made but it’s better to try and fail then blah blah blah… we’ll see what happens!