Pyramid of Arts

I've been offered a position as an artist with Pyrmaid! I'm really excited to make a start, and this is the opportunity that I've been most fired up about in months.

SO MANY EXHIBITIONS

I've been making a conscious effort to kick-start my brain into doing something, ANYTHING even mildly creative by attending as many exhibitions as I can recently. If you're stuck in a funk, just keep re-feeding your brain until it starts working again.

This week I made the most of being in London, and saw two shows: The show of Laura Carlin's work at the House of Illustration, and (more excitingly), an exhibition of outsider art, curated by Jarvis Cocker, at the Museum of Everything in Marylebone. It was almost an extension of the Journey's Into the Outside series that Cocker made in 1998 (it was watching that series a few years ago that kindled my interest in outsider art), and it was just spectacular. Over this last year, outsider art has become a subject that is of real interest to me, especially as I've become increasingly interested in the therapeutic potential of art-making. That pure creativity can flow so continuously from an individual is an amazing, amazing thing. It's profound, even. Art-making is such a powerful force, we should never underestimate or trivialize just how powerful it can be, regardless of whose hand its from.

2 interviews

Went to two really great interviews yesterday, one with Pyramid of Arts Leeds and the other with Leeds Mencap, for a role as a volunteer arts & crafts coordinator. This role would involve being responsible for devising and delivering art-making workshops for kids with a wide range of special needs. Both interviews went really well, and I'm excited at the prospect of getting some real-world experience that could help me with my post-graduate studies. Feel so refreshed for a day outside the studio, life is better on the outside.

Paul Peter Piech at the People's History Museum

On Ben's recommendation, I went to go and see the exhibition of Paul Peter Piech's work at the People's History Museum in Manchester. It blew my mind, and heart, wide open. Although I really appreciate the work on a technical/aesthetic level, it was the content that made my seeing it feel oddly serendipitous; as if that work was precisely what I needed to see at that moment in time. 

Later, when I was thinking about exactly why I was attaching such significance to having seen the work, I decided that it was because the work actually means something. It's all alive with meaning and intention and reason for existing. 

Recently I've been feeling increasingly disenchanted with the constrictions that the term 'illustration' can place on art-making, and thinking that 90% of what we're expected to think and care about seems vacuous. This show was a reminder that humanity, and the emotion that pulses through the world and how people relate to the world around them is what is important to me.

I want to start writing. 

Pyramid of Arts

I've been offered an interview to participate in a Leeds based group called Pyramid of Arts, which focuses on giving people who are disabled or otherwise disenfranchised the opportunity to make art! I got in touch with the group because I'm getting increasingly interested in pursuing art therapy after graduation, as a postgraduate study programme. I already have experience as a volunteer worker (with children/young people with special needs), but feel it would be really beneficial to get some more experience in a focused 'art' context, rather than just as a caregiver/holiday club leader.

The organisation seem really interesting, and a lot of their practical work is centred around sensory stimulation and tactile use of media, both of which are becoming increasingly integral to my own practise. 

Why I didn't want to come back this year (and why I'm glad that I did)

I didn't want to come back to college this year. I really, really didn't. After spending the whole summer trapped in a narrow existence of illness, exhaustion and apathy, the thought of coming back to another intense year of hard work and expectations was making me anxious and unhappy. I just didn't think I actually had the strength - physical or mental - to face it yet.

But I did come back. I came back because I felt that it was important that I carried on, through everything - however horrible, or confusing - that was happening to me, perhaps even did something with it. Owned it, made it into something.

So far, I'm glad that I came back. That isn't to say that it's easy - I'm tired all the time, and have difficulty concentrating, and everything is taking me so much longer than the same things would have done this time last year.  But I've also learned a lot in the six weeks since being back:

• It's okay to not be okay. Having bad days is okay. Running at less than 100% because right now you can't expend all that energy is okay. Just hang on in there. "The best way out is always through"
• All the work I care about doing at the moment, is being shaped by my own experiences. It's all far more autobiographical than I thought I'd ever make. But if that's how I'm processing my emotions and experiences, then that's healthy. It takes more bravery to put yourself into your work than I'd appreciated. If you're struggling, it's okay to want to talk about it, and it's okay to want to deal with it in anyway that works for you. 
• I've learned an awful lot about being a bit kinder, gentler. Having never been someone who's very good at 'letting up' or 'switching off', it's a big shock to the system for me to accept having to be happy with whatever I feel I can manage doing at the moment. I'm coming to realise that 'learning' isn't about what happens in universities, it's about finding a place for yourself in relation to the world. 

Markl Hearld at the Scottish Gallery

While I was in Edinburgh this past weekend, I went to go and see Mark Hearld's exhibition, Collage, Pigeons & Platters at the Scottish Gallery. It's quite a small show, but just jam packed with colour, texture and knick knacks. I love the earthiness of all his work, it's all so alive with the human touch. Seeing work like this just reconfirms my suspicions that art best exists in the real world, in all its messy, painterly glory

PPP3 intro task

Who are you now - has anything changed your view of your practice? 

• I want to use my own practice and any emotional understanding I have of the practices of others' as a tool for good - specifically for healing/therapeutic purposes 
• I definitely do not want to 'be an illustrator' for commercial gain. An artist? Perhaps, alongside another, more world-based practice. I still have a lot of respect for illustration as a practice, and for illustrators and graphic artists, but that is not what I want for myself. 
• My own personal circumstances are making me want to see and use creativity as a healing process.
• Undoing all I know about 'illustration', and returning to the raw fundamentals of creating, and the joy of creativity. It's okay to take steps backward.

"And once the storm is over you won't remember how you made it through, how you managed to survive. You won't even be sure, in fact, whether the storm is really over. But one thing is certain. When you come out of the storm you won't be the same person who walked in. That's what this storm is all about" - Haruki Murakami, from Kafka On The Shore 

This quotation has been floating around in my head for a while now. 

What are your plans for the structure of your future practice? 

• I want to continue with post-graduate studies in Art Therapy. I want to distance any practice I have at present from 'illustration' as a discipline. 
• Want to start building an academic-based thread of my practice, deepening my understanding of art therapy and creation as catharsis/a healing tool. 

post-summer mega crit 26/09

I loved this page, although it's quite throwaway and diary-esque. There's something very melancholic about it. 

I always really like Amy Choi's miniature drawings, and these little vignettes are so charming. Although I've always known that I prefer 'analogue' work to 'digital' work, I'm think it's only quite recently that I've started to realise why that it, beyond the fairly superficial reason of being able to better appreciate the movement of the artist's hand. I find that I can better understand the time, and thought processes behind hand-rendered work. It's more interesting to think about. What makes people embrace embrace imperfection? 

Quite what it is about this drawing that I find so attractive, I don't know. There is a very graphic quality to the face in profile, which couples so interestingly with the very drawn, stylised lines.

life's a pitch issuu

creative presence (or not)

Presentation slideshow

Bit of self-assessment

An attempt to iron my mind

What am I about?

I'm about stories, thoughts and feelings. People, places, and pictures. Human connection is everything and more. Have some fun, do some good, and never ever stop questioning, and marveling at, the world. Be passionate and be compassionate. Have a questioning mind, and a humane spirit.
Work hard. Make mistakes, make more mistakes, and just keep waiting and working to make good.

What is my practice about?

My practice is driven forward by emotion. I want to make people feel real feelings, evoke real emotions. My practice is a celebration of analogue process, and I want to make real, tangible things that exist in the physical world. Make stuff to fall in love with, make stuff to pause at. Feel big feelings and have even bigger ideas. Be sensitive, but not sentimental. Craft is key. Have integrity. Prioritize trying to make beautiful art above trying to make money. My practice is still a seedling.

What are my practical skills?

- I can draw, and I can paint
- I have a developing understanding of how to use colour and tone
- I'm getting braver with shape and space
- Adequate understanding of print processes
- Adequate abilities with Photoshop

What are my personal skills?

- I can connect with people
- I can manage my workload (sort of)
- I'm inquisitive, and curious about the world
 - I care about things, and people and ideas. Apathy is the enemy of creativity.

Where am I now?

At a stage where I'm just about starting to figure all of this out. Making peace with what my work is, and what it is I want to make work about. Finally starting to feel secure. Excited to keep going.
- Very interested in specialist publishing
- Very interested in theory and contextual thought, what shapes the way we decode the world
- Not yet interested in the really commercial side of illustration
- Starting to understand what defines my practice, and what makes my pictures mine.
-Getting better at stepping over pre-defined notions of success

Where do I want to be/what do I want to be doing?

- Learning, all of the time
- Making beautiful work
- Starting to put the visual language that I'm developing through different processes. Seeing how far I can carry my work
- Acting on the confidence boost the last couple of days has given me

presentation 'script' (notes/pointers)

Presentation script

1)

-At the end of level 4 I stood up here and delivered a very honest presentation about all the difficulties I’d wrestled with throughout the year and how I was still unsure of where I was headed.

-Now, a whole year on, I’m going to do exactly the same thing.

- But now with a bit more confidence and lot more optimism

2)

- One of the main successes of my year has been that my practical work has developed a lot and I feel I am starting to channel a new found energy and confidence into my work. I’ve put a lot of effort into practical process this year, and feel that my ideas and abilities are finally starting to synchronise.

-The way I approach work has changed too, and 504 played an important role here. It was a very ambitious project, and even though I was pleased with my outcomes, I approached the entire process in a pretty relentless and reckless way, and stretched both my abilities and nerves to breaking point.

-Realised that my satisfaction with these four months of solid work had been dampened by how exhausted it left me.  

-Resolved to revise the way I approach my work. I knew I needed to find a way of working that was sustainable.

3)

-In the second half of the year I really tried to act on this realisation which led to what’s been the real breakthrough for me.

-For both 505 and the Cop practical element, I made the conscious decision to make less work, and this in turn has given me the time to make all my work joyfully, which in itself wields good results.

- I have also felt I now have time to make more carefully considered design decisions, and to push myself to use shape, space and colour in braver ways than I have before. Through this new approach I feel I have begun to establish a tone of voice within my work, and can now identify what it is that marks my practice as mine. This is something that I haven’t experienced until now.

4.)

- And the more I make work that I enjoy making, the more I’m starting to realise what the fundamentals of my practice are: emotional charge, human connection. I want to make work to fall in love with, to pause at.

-I think this newfound confidence in my own abilities to make concept and design decisions is in part due to another conscious choice I made this year, which was to actively avoid using contemporary illustration as a frame of reference.

5.)

-Compared with the wealth of visual culture in the world, illustration as we now know it is narrow discipline, and I think that such disciplines can tend toward navel gazing, or being too inward looking. Instead I have found other sources of inspiration.

-Maybe writing about the Artworld for CoP has made me more aware of visual culture as an expanse.

6)

-I have developed real interests in other things, such as the outsider art movement of Iran, textile artists, and graphic artists of the 40s 50s and 60s. Stuff that I personally find far more interesting and enriching than 99% of the stuff to be found on It’s Nice That or ELCAF. I’m also increasingly sceptical of how ‘trendy’ illustration can appear – as with being fashionable comes the inevitability of becoming unfashionable. Right now I’m very happy with finding other ways to feed my mind and eyes and practice, rather than falling into the hole of using what’s hot now as a means to measure myself and my work against the world.

-          This year I’ve done a lot of thinking about what illustration is, and I still haven’t reached an answer that I’m at peace with. But maybe this is a good thing? Just as it’s important to shape an individual definition of success, surely it should be equally important to shape an individual definition of what it is you do.

7.)

-The world is full of amazing, amazing stuff. Bother to look or it.

8)

Now I’m going to talk about the overarching struggle that I’ve had this year, which is with the professionalization of practice. I’m not ready to start thinking of myself, or marketing myself as a professional yet. I certainly think I take a professional approach to the practice I’m developing – I show up every day, I put the work in and I wrestle with my problems until I find solutions -, but I don’t want to present to the world as a professional yet. The feelings of positivity that I’m having right now toward my work have taken such a long time to arrive, and still feel so fresh and new, that I want to savour that for a while, I want to keep it as mine. Mine to develop, mine to expand, and mine to build a real relationship with. I’ve felt that a one-size-fits-all approach has been taken to professionalization that this year, and I’ve been very unhappy about it. It was made clear to us from the beginning that Level 5 would be shaped and driven forward by autonomy, and that we would have to be in control of our own work. But to me, commitment to practical autonomy, earns you the ability to be critically autonomous

Being actively involved with the development of your practice, working at it and thinking a lot about it, what it means, and where it sits in relation to the world allows you to be better spirited than to take a tutor at their word for everything.

- I’m not naïve, and I completely understand the importance of professionalization to, but that’s not where I’m at yet. When I’ve spent a bit longer getting to know the work I’m making, I’ll consider how to present that work to the world.

-          If you’re not going to do it with conviction and honesty then don’t do it. Don’t be passive.

9)

-          This isn’t to say that I’m not ready to start giving some thought to my future – I’m already seriously considering whether a Master’s programme would be a good route for me to follow after my degree, as I can identify that education works as a very good structural framework for me. 505 and Life’s a pitch have also helped me to identify publishing as an area of interested. 

-          I’m also really excited about CoP 3 – I do well with long timeframes, and being able to get utterly engrossed.

10)

 – The main thing I’m trying to carry forward into next year is this new sense of calm and perspective that I’ve found. Time will keep passing, if you keep working you will keep improving, and however overwhelming or all-consuming pressure can feel, compared to infinity all of this means less than nothing.

-          Keep having big feelings, and bigger ideas. Keep wondering at the world.

11)

-Thank you for listening. Does anyone have any questions?

keep going

Grew the balls to speak to Fred today, and voice all the issues I'm having with PPP. Came away from it feeling much better, soothed by the bit of reassurance that just because my ideas and feelings about practice are developing in a different way to a lot of the people around me, doesn't mean that I'm doing anything wrong. Determined to keep asking questions, and wrestling with ideas. 

WHAT TO REMEMBER:

-There is no direct path from A to B

- Just as no two practices should be the same, no two journeys to the realization of those practices should be the same.

- Concentrate on what's important to you

- Keep asking questions. Eventually you'll find answers. It will be these answers that make carrying on worthwhile.

Olivier Kugler

Really inspiring and interesting lecture from Mr Kugler. Drawing is potent.

I find it interesting how his practice balances such involved, documentary-esque projects, with commercial work. What's the driving force? Is there genuine conviction and commitment behind what he does, in either practice? It is propelled by the need to tell people's stories, any kind of moral position, or does he just do it because he can? It's fascinating to think about. What a life.

I only wish he'd spoken more about the emotional/psychological factor of what he does. It's such a strange place he occupies, somewhere between journalist, draughtsman, visual reporter… Surely it's impossible to retain complete emotional detachment from his subjects, so how can anyone process seeing the horror of refugee camps? Wow wow wow. 

                                                                   

My 'business cards'

I think a business card should be like putting a little piece of your practice in someone's pocket - just a portable extension of your creative brain. With this in mind, as an accompaniment to everything I've said about my reluctance to present as a professional, I've knocked up these. 

Are these business cards? I think so. They're memorable, a distinctive format, and definitely carry my visual stamp. They serve as an example of my regular colour palette, and convey my interest in hand rendered type. They also make clear where my practice is right now.

Looking to the future...

Had a really interesting conversation with Matt and Jamie, today. I wanted to talk to them about their experiences with MA programmes, as I'm almost 100% certain that I want to move onto an MA programme after I graduate. They asked me what it was that made me think that I wanted to do a Master's programme, and talking through my reasoning really helped clarify plenty of things in my mind:

• I'm in a good place right now, and just beginning to make peace with the way that I approach practice, and the kind of work I do and can make. But I'm only at the very, very beginning, and don't feel anywhere near ready yet to launch off into the world. 
• I just need time, and the chance to immerse myself completely. 
• For me, personally, education is a very effective framework. I definitely need real structure in my life, even if this structure based on only occasional, but vigorous and engaging interaction with tutors.
• I'm not ready to leave education yet. This course should be about learning and growing and evolving and getting things wrong and then getting things right. I have absolutely no intentions of emerging at the end of these three years as a fully formed 'illustrator'. Want to keep pushing. 

Over the summer I'm going to start seriously looking at MA courses, maybe arranging some visits? Also I shall make the most of having to spend making work for the love of making it, as I will need to start putting together a portfolio.

Matt gave me some contact details for people he knows that have gone through MA programmes in Edinburgh and Stockholm, respectively. I'm going to try and compose some thoughtful and useful questions to send them, in the hope of gaining some more specific insight about just what a Master's programme could offer me.

I'm not ready for this yet, and the reasons why.

I had a conversation with John Watters today, and it was one of the most meaningful conversations about my practice that I've had for a long time. This last stretch of PPP this year has had me very mixed up and troubled. Make a business card. Make a website. Write your CV. Get an Instagram. Think of yourself as a professional. All these things we've been told to do, and all these things I'm not yet ready to do.

I love making pictures. I love learning, both being educated and educating myself. It has taken me this long to reach a place where I'm really at peace with how I'm starting to make work and approach work and have ideas, and right now I'm feeling so joyfully new to this. Right now I'm only ready to keep learning, and keep evolving, and keep playing and keep creating, and keep getting lost in making things  only for the sake of making them - and I'm definitely not ready to think of myself as a professional. I don't want to, either.  

As I said to John, my skills as a practitioner have come so far from where they were this time last year, and I hope they're still so far off from where they'll be this time next year, and the year after next.  I can better understand why building a CV would be of such importance were I actively trying to 'make it' as a professional and attract work, but I'm not. I have zero intentions of trying to attract professional, paid work yet. This time is for immersion, for learning. So why go through the motions? For some people this is great - they're ready to start thinking of themselves as professionals. But I'm not, and I refuse to be told that I have to. I fundamentally disagree with this one-size-fits-all approach to development - this is an art school. Maybe I'm being an idealist, but surely the emphasis should be on the joy of development, not on the professionalization of a second year practice? The work I make now, and the relationship I have with that work, is mine, and I want to keep it like that, at least for now. I'm so happy to be still figuring all of this out, but it's still so new. 

Last year I did an internship with Owen Gildersleeve, and got to go with him to the launch of Secret 7" 2015. While there I had a conversation with Ciara Phelan, a collage artist. She was asking me about my experiences so far on my degree and talked to me about her experiences on a Graphic Design degree. She told me that her biggest regret about the formative years of her practise was putting things 'out there' before she was ready too. So I'm heeding her advice. 

When I have a body of work to share, I will. When I have a more wholly formed creative identity, all of this will follow. I'm not naive, and I understand the importance of self-promotion and practicalities in today's  industry, but the time isn't right just yet.

With John's support, I feel justified in putting the brakes on this aspect of PPP for now. That isn't to say I'm putting the brakes on my personal and practical development. That will keep evolving and growing and changing as I continue figuring out my place in all this, and keep falling in love with pictures and creativity and ideas. 

These are some very honest thoughts and feelings. I hope they are understood.

Thinking about CoP3

I thought that the Cop3 proposal I submitted was just too vast, and have already done a lot of thinking about how to narrow it down - getting very excited about next year now.

Although I was originally thinking about representations of sex as sin or salvation and other religious iconography in medieval art (or something), I'm thinking more about iconography in general.
Thinking about trying to build my project around the Codex Seraphinianus, and possibly the Voynich manuscript. Maybe William Blake as well, with his completely refashioned perimeters of reality.

A project about the meaning of meaning?

OUIL505 end of module evaluation

Good good pictures: Anna Zemankova

So beautiful and strange. These are very obviously botanical drawings, but they don't exist in our world. A dreamy re imagining of reality. 

Good good pictures: Joseph Lambert

Recently stumbled across this artist. These are all huge mixed media pieces on cardboard. They're all so vibrant, so alive. 

Tales at Sea logo

I've joined forces with a Leeds-based folk band, and they asked me to design their logo! Their front woman saw my print in the show at CMV. Was surprised and quite flattered to be asked - I've always maintained that taking on commissioned work isn't something I'm looking to do yet (and I stand by this), but after getting to know all the people involved and what they and their music are about I feel it's a good fit. There is also the chance of some flyers for shows and maybe the artwork for an EP in the pipeline, so watch this space ...

fuck fashion

My CoP project this year was kick started by my listening to Grayson Perry's 2013 Reith Lectures. The entire series makes for good listening, but there's something in Democracy Has Bad Taste that really resonates with me.

"With being fashionable comes the inevitability of becoming unfashionable"

This summarizes a lot of of the mixed emotions and struggles that I have with illustration as a discipline. So much of, certainly, the contemporary work that I see out there is trendy. Trend-driven. And boring. And vacuous. It has nothing to say about the human condition, or any of the most interesting and difficult questions that hang over us. Fashion is, by nature, cyclical. So does anything that is fashionable spend at least 50% of its time being irrelevant?

I'm becoming increasingly aware of how emotionally charged my practice is, and can't help but wonder if it's going to hinder my progress on this course. It's weird - the happier and more invested I'm becoming in my practice, the less happy and invested I'm becoming in the mechanics of this course. There is still so much 'figuring out' I have to do about the world.

 I don't want to make fashionable work.

Upcoming

There's an exhibition at the House of Illustration from May - September all about rarely seen picture books from Soviet Russia. I love picture books, and I've become very interested in Soviet-era illustration this year, so can't wait to see it.

Although I've never made child-orientated work myself before, it is a direction I'm think about trying to take my work next year, even if just as an experiment.

There's also this masterclass taking place at HOI this summer, that I'm going to try and go to. Although having a long stretch of Summer to just draw and unwind is great in itself, I think a few structured creative endeavours (masterclasses/self-set briefs etc) might help keep the cogs whirring.

PPP tutorial 14/03

These are some of the key questions I need to be asking myself as I move forward with this brief, and start putting together my creative CV, skills audit, personal statement etc:

• Who am I as a creative? What do I think about my work, and where I'm headed with it?
• Where do I want to work? Why do I want to work in that part of the creative industries? How am I going to get there?
• What are my strengths? What are my weaknesses?
• Where am I going to start looking for contacts? How am I going to approach them?

I'm still feeling a bit unsure about this  part of the module, as though I'm not ready to tackle it yet. I genuinely do not feel as though I've evolved enough as a practitioner yet to know what defines me as a creative.  I'm going to try and get a one-to-one talk with either Patrick or John, hopefully that will help clarify a few of the problems that are currently mixing me up. 

Developing a visual identity

Been starting to think a bit about what defines me (visually) as a practitioner, and how I can use this to develop promotional material, business cards, etc. It's quite hard to mentally sift through all the crap that I clutter my sketchbooks/notebooks with, so I've been trying to play with the basic elements of my picture making. 

Colour

When I use colour in my work, I use a very limited colour palette (6 colours + white, to be precise). I only started to feel more confident with colour after I started working like this, as it just eliminated so much of the choice that I find a bit overwhelming. I think I'll probably to incorporate this defining characteristic of my practice in my promo things, but as of yet I'm unsure whether to try and show how many colours I can mix from this palette, or whether just to use the raw 6. Hopefully some more visual thinking and exploration will help me figure this out.


Type

Hand rendered type is really starting to play an integral part in how I see my practice developing, especially as we move forward with 505. When I had my tutorial with Ben he was really enthusiastic about my lettering, so I think I should definitely try to capitalise on this in my promo material. Especially now that I'm sure I would like to work in (in some aspect) in exclusive publishing and with books, I think that being confident with hand-lettering is probably quite a marketable skill.



Pattern + shape

Although I've always been a doodler, there are some patterns and motifs that have cropping up more and more in my work recently, and I'd be interested to see how I could push this forward. Could end up being quite a nice , simple solution to the problem of how to market myself. A few visual motifs that could be applied to a website/business cards/letter head etc? Could create a nice cohesiveness. 

Still not happy about all this. 

Good good pictures: Mehrdad Rashidi

Mehrdad Rashidi is an outsider artist from Iran, and his drawings are some of the most potent I think I've ever seen. It's so joyous, such a celebration of what the drawn line can be. No pretence, no elitism, just pure drawing. Wonderful, human, inspiring. 

Making a conscious effort to look at so many different types of art + creativity has been the best thing I've done to feed my mind in this past year. Outsider art is wild and interesting and real and uplifting and puzzling and maddening and enlightening all at once. Just what pictures should be. Drawing can be anything and for anyone.

Pete Seeger

Watched this amazing documentary about the folk-singer and activist Peter Seeger. Reminded me of what it is to be utterly human. We need more humanity in the world. Human connections and relationship can be a force of such good.

Good good pictures: Milton Avery

MAKES ME WANT TO USE COLOUR this stuff is dreamy 

Good good pictures: Magda Skupinska

I'm not a very shape-based worker, but there's something I find very visually pleasing about this balance. Great colours, too.

sad mag presentation

Visit from Anorak magazine

On Wednesday, Cathy Olmedillas (the owner & editor of Anorak magazine) came in to have a talk with us. This was really interesting, and she raised some very interesting and thought provoking points about trying to publish an alternative in a saturated market. Cathy also had some interesting ideas about how intelligent and perceptive children can be, the artistic necessity of breaking down stereotypes and idea boundaries, and what a positive effect this can have on young minds.

I don't make work that is aimed at children, but if I do in future  I think Cathy's talk has given me some pointers to bare in mind:

- Don't underestimate the intelligence of the young. Metaphysical notions such as friendship, morality and happiness are not beyond children. Don't be patronising. Children's intellects need to be lifted up, not held down.

- Pictures can communicate just as clearly and profoundly as words. In fact, for children, maybe even more so?

She also brought some great pictures (always yum)

Good good pictures: Carrie Strine

Maybe I should learn to quilt. I've been referring to Strine's quilts a lot recently, as I've been starting to dabble with painted pattern work of my own. 

Off The Page exhibition launch

We had the Off The Page private view on Friday evening at Colours May Vary - what a great experience! It was nice to see everyone come together (and a lot of people not on the course as well!) to celebrate some really great work.

There was a very nice relaxed atmosphere, and I had some really good informal chats with people. I had been worrying that I hadn't made any business cards or brushed up on my elevator pitch (quite a few others had) but I needn't have worried. Don't think I embarrassed myself too badly when talking to anyone. However I will learn from this and maybe take a bit more of a professional approach to these events in the future, and have some proper business cards printed.

'Off the Page' exhibition, hanging the show

When we had to sign up for roles to take on during the exhibition process, I put myself forward for the hang team (despite being a good head shorter than everyone else on the team). This is because I'm interested in curation and thought it would be a great bit of experience.

Learning from the difficulty that last year had with exhibiting, the college provided us with frames this year, meaning we had a uniform hang - this made our lives so much easier! Luckily Becky at Colours May Vary was very relaxed and encouraging, and just let us get on with putting the work where we thought it worked. The process of arranging the work was actually really good fun, and it was an interesting challenge to be made to consider what totally unrelated pieces sat together well on the wall.

I'd definitely be interested in doing some more small curator roles in the future, maybe the end of year show? We did a really good job together, and had a lot of positive feedback about how sharp the show looked, which was very encouraging to hear!

'Sad Mag' pitch evaluation

Considering that none of us really consider presenting to be our strength, I think the presentation went quite well! I definitely felt far more confident, and calmer, delivering this presentation than I have when presenting in the past, and I think maybe this was the result of everyone else being quite 'together'. This was a really nice thing as we've had a lot of fun doing the work for this project and formulating this idea, and so it was great to be able to actually enjoy the presentation itself.

Strengths of pitch:

• I definitely think that extending the 'sad mag aesthetic' throughout the slides was a good idea - it helped us better put over what the publication is really about (it's vibe, if you will) without us having to laboriously explain it
• We had really good feedback - the common consensus was that people would actually buy sad mag! This was really encouraging, and definitely means that I'll think about this as a viable business opportunity that we could develop in the future (Patrick suggested it as a good summer project? Could be interesting.) 
• I think that we successfully managed to get over the ethos of sad mag - sad without really being sad - which was a relief as it was something we were all a little concerned about. Again, I think having the visual synergy (lots of pictures of snood-clad dogs) helped with this,  We also spent quite a lot of time talking through our manifesto, so we definitely tried our best. 
• As with the above, we tried to keep our presentation humorous enough to help people understand our angle, and hopefully make it engaging, without overdoing the humor. We knew we had to keep it dry enough so that it seemed like a business pitch.

Weaknesses of pitch:

• Unfortunately Jack couldn't be with us to present, and he was in charge of everything finance! He very helpfully sent us over is script and all his research, but we probably still didn't talk about our finances in the way that he could have.
• Maybe we focused too much on the ethos (although it is important!) and not enough on content. On reflection I think that maybe we should have knocked up an example of an article, or a photo feature of something, just to show how our ethos would extend through our content.

I've really enjoyed this project, and I think we have worked well together and had a lot of fun as a team. Getting good peer feedback was really rewarding, and I hope we will keep thinking about sad mag in the future. This has been a very different side to PPP, compared to all the work we have done before, and has been useful in making me think about what goes on outside the college walls. Sometimes it's beneficial to be pulled into the 'real' world, and to be made to consider practical moves and logistics, rather than just making good pictures. 

Printing problems

I shot myself in the foot here - since deciding that I would digitally print for CMV, I left printing my concertina book until the last minute thinking that it would be easy. On the day I had my print slot booked, James was ill and the digital resource was closed. This was on the Thursday, and the work had to be packaged and ready to go by 4pm on Friday. James was still ill on Friday, so a small group of us managed to plead with some of the IT staff to open the resource so we could print.

I decided very much at the eleventh hour that I just wanted to submit a single print for the show, and not the whole concertina. I'd seen the problems that some of my peers had had trying to make books against the clock. That book was such a labour of love I didn't want to do myself short by ruining it.

This is not a professional approach (and I was reminded as such by Fred), but it didn't do any harm this time. But I really need to stop just cutting deadlines like this, or I'll run into serious trouble one day. If I had decided to submit a single print earlier then I would have screen printed it, as opposed to digitally printing it.

Good good pictures: Ben Nicholson

Colours and shapes. Yum. 

Good good pictures: Ben Shahn

I love everything about Ben Shahn's work. Everything - his drawing, painting and print making. Don't think I've ever found an artist whose work resonates so deeply. THIS is what drawing is all about - these images just pulsate with life and character. Can't remember getting this excited by work, ever.

Massive pic spam to follow but JUST LOOK

Visuals for Sad Mag

Here are some of the visuals that Molly has contributed - She has done a great job with them, and I can now really visualize Sad Mag as an interesting physical publication. The bitmap on the cover images was a really good idea, especially as we have discussed the possibility of having Sad Mag risograph printed - I think this extra touch would really elevate the product.

There's quite a kitsch look, lo-fi look about the visuals, reminiscent of early i-D magazine, or perhaps The Face? The Face went out of print a long time ago now, and obviously iD is now a glossy, but it's good to be able to identify what group of publications Sad Mag could belong to. I think these two examples are more in keeping with the Sad Mag ethos than Vice magazine, which we discussed a lot in the early stages. We want something mellower and perhaps a bit more knowing a self-deprecating than Vice.

Molly has also designed a good logo for Sad Mag. We seem to have adopted the snood-dog as our official mascot, and I think he's working.  It's a nice, clean logo, and so will work well when applied to things other than the publication, such as merchandise  or our social media pages!