Brief 02:
Yoke - Dialogue Exhibition
Nathan Bolton
Yoke | Dialogue Exhibition
Yoke ‘Dialogue’ Exhibition: Brief Overview Brief
Concept
Audience
Part 1 Design and create the visual identity and promotional materials for an ambitious themed print exhibition. Effectively promote the exhibition through different channels of media to spread awareness and engagement of the exhibition. Promotional material should reflect and inform the look and feel of the exhibition through the use of various print processes.
The concept of the exhibition is to create an exhibition space that brings like-minded creatives together and help spur a dialogue between them. There is a big stigma over the relationship of student designers and professional designer, which we hope this will diminish and show that the two can work together in a great way.
The audience will be creative professionals and students, within Leeds and the surrounding areas. People that are interested in print with also be the target for the exhibition.
Part 2 Curating the Exhibition. Curate a contemporary and engaging exhibition space to effectively display a range of themed artwork. Produce a way finding system and an innovative way of display artwork throughout the exhibition space. The aim of the exhibition is to bring people together and create a community of creatives to enable and encourage collaboration.
Tone of Voice The tone of voice for the exhibition focus on the idea of creating dialogue between visitors within the exhibition space.
Background Information
Purpose
Deliverables
We are a duo with an aim to curate an exhibition space that spurs dialogue between creatives.
As print was a common interest between me and Eve we wanted to work on a project centered around this. The project soon turned into an exhibition with the purpose to create an exhibition space that spurs dialogue between professional creatives and students. It was also a great way to expose ourselves as soon to be graduate designers.
1. Brading & Promotion of exhibition 2. Curation of Exhibition 3. Printed artwork for the exhibition
The objective is to encourage contributions for a week long, non profit pop up print exhibition and shop that will be held at the Leeds Corn Exchange in March 2014. Leeds is an up and coming city for design this will help put us on the map.
Nathan Bolton
By using a bling collaboration within the submission process. We will match two submissions together that compliment each other, which will be screen printed over the top of each other to create a 2 colour screen print for the exhibition. This is how the dialogue is created because two designers work are now together in one final print, finding each other is the nature of the opening night.
As the project was based around screen printing the purpose for myself was to improve upon on printing skills and get a better knowledge around the print process as it is something that is becoming more and more focused on within my own practice. Also working on a brief which is on such a large scale and one which puts myself out into the public is a great experience and one could be beneficial for me.
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Research Book As a collaborative brief we wanted to put together a research book right at the start of the project, so had a collection of inspiration and influences that we both found interested and wanted to encorporate within the ideas of our exhibition. Further into the project we kept referring back to the research book, as it was a great source of imagery, this did become vital to the project and ended up being more of a visual guide.
Nathan Bolton
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Branding Yoke Identity The concept of the exhibition is to bring and join people together. We chose the name Yoke as a callaborative name to go under as it means ‘ to join, couple, link or unit’. Exhibition Logo The exhibition logo is customised form the stencil font Femoralis. The reasoning behind this is that qutation marks can be found within the letter ‘a’ and ‘g’, which link back to the idea of creating a dialogue. Together we decided on a name for the collaboration and created a logo which reflected the idea of the curating exhibitions. The Logo stands for the letter ‘Y’ in the word Yoke, the three seperate shapes of the logo represent the idea of walls and building up areas to create an exhibit.
Nathan Bolton
We wanted to make the logo represent the idea of the exhibition. The logo was customised from a sourced typeface. We liked the small details within the typeface that makes it look like speech marks are used to create the letterforms. This gave the typeface another meaning and tied in perfectly with the theme of the exhibition.
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Exhibition Spaces Before we started working on the project and exhibition fully, we wanted to secure a exhibition space and get preliminary dates booked, so we had a deadline to work towards. We spent a few days contacting galleries and exhibition spaces within Leeds to see if any were interested in us holding our exhibition with them. We sent out a brief outlining what we wanted to achieve and to see what their response was. The venues we looked at varied in size and price, which was a good experience and great knowledge for the future. After visiting a couple of placed the Corn exchange seemed to be the most promising. The building itself is amazing, the architecture is stunning and the types of shops within it are within the arts and culture scene. We spoke with the management people at the Corn Exchange to discuss us using a space within the building. The cost was ÂŁ100 + VAT for a unit within the building for one week.
Nathan Bolton
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Exhibition Brief & Proposals As the exhibition was submission based, we created a brief for creatives to work to. The brief was put online and also sent out as part of the invitations.
yoke: dialogue exhibition
Artwork Guide Specifications
To secure the exhibition space within the Corn Exhcange, we had to put a proposal together to inform them what we were using the space for and intending to do within the week of the rent.
calling for submissions About Yoke
Yoke is a duo based in Leeds with an aim to curate an exhibition space that spurs dialogue between creatives.
Submissions
Yoke welcomes creatives from all backgrounds to contribute to the exhibition. We’re now ready to start recieving your ideas based around the theme of ‘Dialogue’.
Dialogue
The objective is to encourage contributions to a week long non profit pop up print exhibition and shop that will be held at the Leeds Corn Exchange from 28th Feb to 7th March 2014. During this
Submissions can take any form directly on past conversations, forms of interaction or it could spread further afield to what you think communication is today.
‘dialogue’ where each creative will submit a design that will be used in a blind collaboration. Contributors must be open to their submissions being manipulated through the use of print and the match making process, that will pair two submissions together. This will create a series of screen-printed artworks that will be displayed throughout the series of events.
Nathan Bolton
Dear Amber, We are writing to you following our discussion about the possibility of renting a space for a week in Leeds Corn Exchange. We have provided a short proposal below of our intentions of the use of the space.
About Yoke
The proposal
creatives. With a background in Graphic design at Leeds College Of Art, Yoke aims to bridge the gap between university and the
suitable space on the top balcony. The size of the space will have to accommodate a sufficient amount of guests for
Yoke is a duo based in Leeds with an aim to curate an exhibition space that spurs dialogue between
creative industry.
Specifications Submit to:
yokeleeds@gmail.com Art work must be: - A3 Landscape or portrait - Vector or halftone images - Black and white - 300 dpi -
Yoke intends to hold the exhibition at the Leeds Corn Exchange for a week, in a
the private viewing and a series of scheduled events throughout the week.
The objective
The objective is to encourage contributions to a week long pop up print exhibition and shop that will be held at the Leeds Corn
small events, running in line
The theme of the exhibition is
Proposal Form November 2013
of the theme. It could reflect
week, Yoke will hold a series of with the theme of the exhibition.
yoke: dialogue exhibition
Proposed Dates
Friday 28th February 2014 – Friday 7th March 2014
Exchange in March 2014. During this week, Yoke will hold a series of small events, running in line with the theme of the exhibition. The theme of the exhibition is ‘dialogue’ where each creative will submit a design that will be used in a blind collaboration. Therefore Yoke will pair two submissions together in order to
We dont accept responsibility for the copyright for any submissions used.
create a series of screen-printed
Sales of artwork cover artwork product and the exhibition running costs.
throughout the series of events.
artwork that will be displayed
Funding
In order to run the event Yoke will need help with funding the running costs of the event. This will include £100 for the rent of the space for a week. If possible any contribution towards material costs would be much appreciated. Please contact us if you need any further information. Eve & Nathan, Yoke
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Creating Dialogue As part of the invitation, we wanted to include a screen print which showed what we were aiming to create within the exhibition space. In order to do this we both did our own interpresetation of the submission brief. When it came to printing them, we matched our designs together and manipulated them through the process of screenprinting this created the two colour A6 postcards, which we inteded to send out within the invitations.
Nathan Bolton
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Screen Printing The screen printed postcards were a sucess and we were both very pleased with how well the designs translated our vision of the brief and to show as an example of what we wanted to achieve for the exhibition prints. We experimented with a range of inks and printing methods. We produced a large amount of prints, that we will send out to studios and students on our course to get them involved with the project and exhibition.
Nathan Bolton
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Invitations The exhibition is abour creating dialogue between creatives. We liked the idea of using an envelope and physically posting this to people as it is a form of dialogue. We decided on using an evelope, but we wanted to put a twist on it and make it more aesthetically pleasing. Coming up with the idea that the envelope will be sewn around the edges, it will make the user interact with the product more and be more memorable to them. Inside will be the mail shot, this will have a acreen printed A6 postcard attached with a personalised message and on the back the brief will be printed giving details of the submission process and theme to design the submission artwork to.
Nathan Bolton
Yoke presents Dialogue Leeds Corn Exchange 29th February 2014
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Invitations We created the invitation to spur a dialogue with local creatives and studios, to personalise each invitation we write a message within each of invitations. The invitations were a collection of the A6 postcard and the submission brief. The invites were a success amongst our classmates and the studios we sent them out to. This was the reaction we hoped for from the invites and our idea of creating a dialogue with other creatives through the means of the invitation and the traditional postal service did work well. The invites also were a great advertising tool, as the recipients photographed the envelopes / invites and posted them online through the means of twitter and instgram which got us more attention.
Nathan Bolton
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Exhibition Poster To advertise the exhibition we did a print run of a two colour poster. The poster using similar colours to that of the artwork for the exhibition, creating a consistent aesthetic throughout the project. The poster included all the branding of the exhibition plus the exhibition information which was typeset over a two layers. The bottom layer in black consisted of all the submission entry names - we throught it would be a nice idea to include all the submission and show how many were actually involved with the exhibition. The top layer - orange held all the details of the exhibition - this included opening night details, a brief description of the exhibition and running times and location of the exhibition. The posters were put around the university building and around locations within Leeds.
Nathan Bolton
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Web Presence As the exhibition was all about print, it made sense to create the printed poster and to do it in the style of the exhibition artwork. But alongside this we also made sure we had an online presence. The internet is a great tool for advertising, as anyone around the world can view a website. We found this very helpful with the advertising of the event and for the submissions. Opening the submission online was a great idea and it attracted creatives from abroad, with the likes from Portugal, Germany and Holland. We created a website, which held the brief and details of the exhibition, it also linked to our blog which we kept updating throughout the project to show the progress of the exhibition. Along with the website, we had a facebook page, twitter and instagram. The social media channels - espcially twitter was a great way to advertise the event and get people involved.
Nathan Bolton
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Curating the Space Pop up shops and exhibitions are becoming more popular in the UK as it is evident it is a cost effective way of making money / putting on events without signing a lease or being tied to a contract. At the beginning of the project we noticed that Leeds Corn Exchange had a lot of empty units, which is a shame to see in such a great building. We decided to investigate into this further and see how we could utilise the spaces and use it effectively to our advantage. We spoke to the Corn Exchange and after many meetings we manage to rent a large unit with fantastic windows and a quirky curved wall. After giving the floor a quick paint and taking away old carpets etc it became a white box which we could now put our mark on and create the exhibition space. Using the visual guide, we collected imagery and inspiration of what we wanted to create within the space and with the help from family we were able to build wooden frames, bring in standalone walls and install lighting to tranform the space into a great exhibition area. It took a while for this to all come together, but through effective time management and help from family and friends we got the exhibition space ready in time for the opening night.
Nathan Bolton
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The Matchmaking Process We asked a variety of creatives and studios within Leeds and the surrounding areas to submit work that would be used in a collaborative way and be showcased in the final exhibition ‘Dialogue’. Each designer consented to this, with teh understanding they would not be able to choose their creative partners. Therefore the contributors had to open to their submissions being manipulated through the use of print and the match making process. We had over 150 submissions, each of these were pair together to create the final two layered print. In order to match the submissions together we printed them black and white and compared designs together using the lightbox to see how the designs would overlay each other. We came up with a system to use large images / block colour as background layers and match a type, illustration or small image over the top. This worked throughout the whole process and made it alot easier to create the paired work.
Nathan Bolton
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Two Weeks of Print At the start of the project we had set out to keep the exhibition local, but through the web presence and the use of social media, many creatives from abroad started to submit to the exhibition, totally with over 150 submissions. We had two weeks to print all the artwork for the exhibition, this was over three different formats - A2, A3 and A6. We lived in the print studios from morning till dusk, printing and exposing screens, in total we printed and coated around 50 screens. To complete such a mamoth task in the time frame we had, we worked on a rotating system. Having multiple screens ready to print at once, we could effectively print the artwork one after each other and they would dry ready to the second layer by the time we had printed the rest of the artwork. The printing weeks resulted in great team work, we took it turn to wash, coat and expose screens, whilst the other printed artwork and mixed colours. This project was all about teamwork and collaboration, which myself and Eve made a great pair and team throughout this period and the whole project.
Nathan Bolton
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The Preview Evening We were both really interested in curating space. Therefore at the start of the project we heavily researched into this area, to find new and interesting ways of displaying artowork and creating interaction for the audience within an exhibition. We created wooden frames which fit along the curved wall and made use of the light from the large windows, within these we hung artwork using the wooden toppers and wire cable. Installing lighting made a massive difference within the space, it was much lighter and a more inviting space once they were all turned on. It also showcased the work much better as we could direct the light ourselves to certain areas of the exhibition space. The opening night itself was a huge success that was supported by local creatives from Leeds and the surrounding areas. During the night we were asked to do interviews with local blogs and Tv students. We hired a photographer and film maker to capture the evening, so we could take the time to welcome and speak to all the guest we invited.
Nathan Bolton
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Selling the Artwork Initially when planning the exhibition the subject of selling the artwork was a conversation we both had, but we weren’t 100% on how to approach the situation. The uncertanty came from the fact that artwork wasn’t our, we were apart of it as we had printed it, but there was two other designers involved within one print too. This meant splitting the money evenly between everyone if the artwork sold. Therefore we decided against selling any of the work, as it would of creating alot of admin time and taken up alot of our time after the exhibition. However on the opening night we had a lot of interest in the prints and visitors were asking if they were for sale. We came up the idea of selling the artwork to cover costs of the exhibition and for money to be put back in for a second exhibition in the future. For us to do this we needed consent from each of the contributos, so we emailed each one asking for consent. Everyone was fine with idea and more than happy for us to sell the work, so we could put on a second event. Throughout the following week we sold prints and held a print sale on the final day, which we had a great turn out and sold many of the prints.
Nathan Bolton
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