Hasta La Ideas

Print Club London has recruited an impressive lineup of illustrators for an exhibition to coincide with Film4 and Somerset House’s annual “summer screen”.

The illustrators – including Kate Gibb, Joe Wilson, James Joyce and Anthony Burrill – will each produce an original print inspired by one of the films being shown at this year’s series of open air screenings.

The final posters will be on display at Somerset House’s West Wing gallery from August 1 – 21. Each will be limited edition (one of 200) and priced at £40.

Some of the prints are still a work in progress, but Print Club has released a completed illustration by Michael Gillette representing Ken Loach’s 1969 film, Kes (top); a neon pink, black and white print by Hattie Stewart for US high school drama Mean Girls (above) and Joe Wilson’s striking poster depicting Japanese film Throne of Blood (below).

It’s an eclectic collection of films – from horror to Ryan Gosling rom-coms – and the exhibition will include an equally mixed range of artistic styles, from Holly Wales’s signature felt tip pen drawings to Peter Strain, whose work usually combines bold imagery and typography. Print Club co-founders Rose Stallard and Fred Higginson will also be producing prints.

Each artist was asked to choose three films from the 17 being screened, and was allocated a movie based on one of their choices. The project has taken more than a year to plan, and Print Club organisers have had to secure permission from each of the film companies involved.

Most of the prints will remain secret until the exhibition’s launch, but the final artists and their film choices are:

Anthony Burrill – The Way Way Back
Peter Strain – Carrie
Anthony Peters – Raising Arizona
Serge Seidlitz – Gremlins
Kate Gibb – Butch Cassidy & The Sundance Kid
Hvass & Hannibal – Guys & Dolls
Joe Wilson – Throne of Blood
Hattie Stewart – Mean Girls
Jess Wilson – Predator
Michael Gillette – Kes
Holly Wales – Red Shoes
MOL – Crazy Stupid Love
HelloVon – Loved Ones
Rose Stallard – Badlands
Steve Wilson – Untouchables
James Joyce – Baby Jane

A 17th is still to be announced.

For more information, visit printclublondon.com or somersethouse.org.uk

Pink Floyd fans may recognise the cover of our June issue. It’s the original marked-up artwork for Dark Side of the Moon: one of a number of treasures from the archive of design studio Hipgnosis featured in the issue, along with an interview with Aubrey Powell, co-founder of Hipgnosis with the late, great Storm Thorgerson. Elsewhere in the issue we take a first look at The Purple Book: Symbolism and Sensuality in Contemporary Illustration, hear from the curators of a fascinating new V&A show conceived as a ‘walk-in book’ plus we have all the regular debate and analysis on the world of visual communications.

You can buy Creative Review direct from us here. Better yet, subscribe, save money and have CR delivered direct to your door every month.

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Read in-depth features and analysis plus exclusive iPad-only content in the Creative Review iPad App. Longer, more in-depth features than we run on the blog, portfolios of great, full-screen images and hi-res video. If the blog is about news, comment and debate, the iPad is about inspiration, viewing and reading. As well as providing exclusive, iPad-only content, the app updates with new content throughout each month. Get it here.

Illustration collective Le Gun has designed an installation and limited edition print for a new exhibition opening at London’s V&A Museum.

Memory Palace opens on June 18 and is the V&A’s first graphics and illustration exhibition for nearly a decade. Exploring the link between visual arts and storytelling, it includes 20 illustrators and designers’ interpretations of an original story by author Hari Kunzru, commissioned for the project.

The story is a dystopian vision of a future London, in which the global information infrastructure has been wiped out by a storm and books, or any form of remembering, are banned. Kunzru’s narrative follows a renegade group of ‘memorialists’ trying to revive the art of memory.

The exhibition features work by an impressive line-up of artists including Hansje van Halem, Oded Ezer, Eric Kessels and Luke Pearson, who have produced prints, type, short film and hand-painted tiles that re-imagine parts of Kunzru’s text.

Le Gun has also produced a 3D installation for Memory Palace and one for the V&A shop (pictured). One of the illustrations on display at the shop has been made into a limited edition print priced at £75 (below).

Le Gun was founded by Neal Fox, Chris Bianchi, Bill Bragg, Robert Rubbish, Matthew Appleton, Alex Wright and Stephanie von Reiswitz, graduates of London’s Royal College of Art. As well as murals and 3D artworks, they produce a self-titled magazine, and were commissioned to design the shop installation by V&A visual merchandiser Charlene Betteridge, who was impressed by their work for the exhibition.

“Le Gun showed themselves to be a fascinating and incredibly talented collective who have been able to, as a group, develop an incredibly distinctive style – one that would work brilliantly in the shop’s environment,” says Betteridge.

The shop installation also responds to Kunzru’s text, and features literal illustrations of scenes such as a flooded city and a ruined banquet, as well as more abstract interpretations of the author’s post-apocalyptic city.

Memory Palace will run from June 18 until October 20. An interview with the exhibition’s curators and a look at the work included is featured in the June issue of Creative Review, out now. For visitor information, visit vam.ac.uk. To view more of Le Gun’s work, visit legun.co.uk

Pink Floyd fans may recognise the cover of our June issue. It’s the original marked-up artwork for Dark Side of the Moon: one of a number of treasures from the archive of design studio Hipgnosis featured in the issue, along with an interview with Aubrey Powell, co-founder of Hipgnosis with the late, great Storm Thorgerson. Elsewhere in the issue we take a first look at The Purple Book: Symbolism and Sensuality in Contemporary Illustration, hear from the curators of a fascinating new V&A show conceived as a ‘walk-in book’ plus we have all the regular debate and analysis on the world of visual communications.

You can buy Creative Review direct from us here. Better yet, subscribe, save money and have CR delivered direct to your door every month.

CR for the iPad
Read in-depth features and analysis plus exclusive iPad-only content in the Creative Review iPad App. Longer, more in-depth features than we run on the blog, portfolios of great, full-screen images and hi-res video. If the blog is about news, comment and debate, the iPad is about inspiration, viewing and reading. As well as providing exclusive, iPad-only content, the app updates with new content throughout each month. Get it here.

Illustrator Mr Bingo has brought his unique sense of visual humour to bear on a new website for vodka brand Luksusowa.

The Man’s Guide to Manliness, created by AnalogFolk, contains handy tips for men on how to perform everyday activities, such as ‘how to stay in shape’ (see illustration above), or ‘how to choose a dog’ (see artwork below). It ties into the vodka’s wider brand positioning with its focus on ‘manliness’.

According to Jamie Lillywhite, design director at AnalogFolk, Mr Bingo was an obvious choice. “Mr Bingo stood out for us from the start. His illustrations are fairly crude, yet comical, and always play on male orientated humour. This style was perfect for what we had in mind. Each tip provided him with the creative license to showcase his quirkiness and bring the entertaining copy to life.”

The site contains around 33 tips, which visitors can also share via social media. It is not a new digital marketing concept, but Mr Bingo’s illustrations always manage to raise a chuckle, and are amusingly well suited to this tongue-in-cheek style of machismo.

Credits
Agency: AnalogFolk
Creative Lead: Ray Jopson
Design Director: Jamie Lillywhite
Copy Writer: Alistair McKnight
Planner: Nick McWilliams
Account Director: Bill Brock
Agency Producer: Stuart Pearman
User Experience: Julie Herskin
Illustrator: Mr Bingo

Out now, the May 2013 issue of Creative Review is our biggest ever. Features over 100 pages of the year’s best work in the Creative Review Annual 2013 (in association with iStockphoto), plus profiles on Morag Myerscough, Part of a Bigger Plan and Human After All as well as analysis, comment, reviews and opinion.

You can buy Creative Review direct from us here. Better yet, subscribe, save money and have CR delivered direct to your door every month. If you subscribe before May 3, you will get the Annual issue thrown in for free. The offer also applies to anyone renewing their subscription. Details here

CR for the iPad

Read in-depth features and analysis plus exclusive iPad-only content in the Creative Review iPad App. Longer, more in-depth features than we run on the blog, portfolios of great, full-screen images and hi-res video. If the blog is about news, comment and debate, the iPad is about inspiration, viewing and reading. As well as providing exclusive, iPad-only content, the app will also update with new content throughout each month.

YCN Studio and Buck Los Angeles have created a powerful animated video for counselling service ChildLine encouraging children to report sexual abuse.

The four-minute film follows conversations between a ChildLine advisor and a child who is being abused. The conversation is not spoken but written – the adviser’s words are clearly legible in a neat hand drawn type, while the child’s words swirl around the screen.

The animation begins with the child’s struggle to say what has happened to them – their embarrassment and awkwardness is represented by broken lettering and constantly changing fonts. For each statement the child makes, the advisor has a reassuring response, reminding them that they were right to contact ChildLine and that what’s happening to them is wrong.

The script, written by YCN Studio, is based on common questions and concerns raised by children when speaking to ChildLine counsellors and accompanying animations illustrate the child’s relief when talking about their problems: in one scene, when asked how they feel about opening up to ChildLine, we see an image of birds, blue sky and open space as the child, Ash, admits: “I didn’t think you’d believe me”.

By the end of the video, Ash is ready to discuss how they can make what’s happening to them stop and the animation is replaced with a message in stark black and white that reads: “We know how difficult it is to talk about sexual abuse”. It’s the first time abuse is directly mentioned.

Designed for ChildLine’s website, the film is carefully tailored to address both genders and the lack of information about the caller reflects the confidential nature of ChildLine, while removing the possibility that children will dissociate themselves from the character in the video.

“The brief we received for the project was quite open, but included a lot of detail about how children suffering from abuse feel. Lots of them spoke of their difficulty in finding the words to talk about their problems, and feeling like words were stuck in their throat, so we thought illustrating that would be a good way to communicate those feelings without showing anything that would upset viewers or make them feel awkward,” explains YCN Studio director Alex Ostrowski.

Key to the video, says Ostrowski, was demonstrating that it’s OK for children to hang up at any time and that they can contact ChildLine as many times as they like. Without the option of fades or jump cuts to convey passing time, Buck uses clearer type and illustrations of open spaces to communicate progression with each conversation.

The sound and music was designed by Antfood and as Ostrowski explains, voices are omitted to keep the caller’s identity anonymous, allowing viewers to project their own story on to the film.

It’s a carefully constructed and beautifully crafted film, and one that slowly and gently re-assures viewers without making them feel uncomfortable or under pressure. Through the calming colours, illustrations and types, YCN Studio and Buck have captured intense emotions in a video that will hopefully give children the confidence to seek help.

Directed by: Buck
Executive Creative Director: Ryan Honey
Executive Producer: Maurie Enochson
Producer: Ashley Hsieh
Creative Director: Joshua Harvey
Designers: Joshua Harvey, Joe Mullen, Gunnar Pettersson
2D Animators: Laura Yilmaz, Kendra Ryan, Gunnar Pettersson, Claudio Salas, Matt Everton, Thierno Bah, Ege Soyuer, Zach Eastburg, Oliver Dead, Moses Journey
3D Artists: Yates Holley, Alex Dingfelder, Matt Everton
Music and Sound Design: Antfood

Out now, the May 2013 issue of Creative Review is our biggest ever. Features over 100 pages of the year’s best work in the Creative Review Annual 2013 (in association with iStockphoto), plus profiles on Morag Myerscough, Part of a Bigger Plan and Human After All as well as analysis, comment, reviews and opinion.

You can buy Creative Review direct from us here. Better yet, subscribe, save money and have CR delivered direct to your door every month. If you subscribe before May 3, you will get the Annual issue thrown in for free. The offer also applies to anyone renewing their subscription. Details here

CR for the iPad

Read in-depth features and analysis plus exclusive iPad-only content in the Creative Review iPad App. Longer, more in-depth features than we run on the blog, portfolios of great, full-screen images and hi-res video. If the blog is about news, comment and debate, the iPad is about inspiration, viewing and reading. As well as providing exclusive, iPad-only content, the app will also update with new content throughout each month.

Tel Aviv-based illustrator Geffen Refaeli produces a drawing each day that combines elements from various images uploaded to Instagram by different users. The act produces some sweetly surreal results…

Refaeli’s DailyDoodleGram is inspired directly from images found in her Instagram feed, which she then posts on her own page.

Alongside the images, Refaeli then adds the names of the photographers whose work provided the source material for her sketch.

So the drawing shown above references these two images, below, taken by Instagram users ‘reabd’ and ‘lalisch‘.

Some of Refaeli’s pictures have as many as four Instagram sources, but brought together in her single drawing the constituent parts conspire to take on different meanings (there are plenty of drawings more odd than the one above).

The only stipulation on the work is that the referenced images were all taken or uploaded on the same day.

To date, Refaeli has gained 24,000 followers and uploaded nearly 300 drawings. Her Instagrams page is at instagram.com/dailydoodlegram (with prints for sale here), while more of her illustration work is at geffenrefaeli.com. Here are some of my favourite drawings from the last few weeks.

All images are taken from instagram.com/dailydoodlegram, © Geffen Refaeli

Out now, the May 2013 issue of Creative Review is our biggest ever. Features over 100 pages of the year’s best work in the Creative Review Annual 2013 (in association with iStockphoto), plus profiles on Morag Myerscough, Part of a Bigger Plan and Human After All as well as analysis, comment, reviews and opinion

You can buy Creative Review direct from us here. Better yet, subscribe, save money and have CR delivered direct to your door every month. If you subscribe before May 3, you will get the Annual issue thrown in for free. The offer also applies to anyone renewing their subscription. Details here

CR for the iPad

Read in-depth features and analysis plus exclusive iPad-only content in the Creative Review iPad App. Longer, more in-depth features than we run on the blog, portfolios of great, full-screen images and hi-res video. If the blog is about news, comment and debate, the iPad is about inspiration, viewing and reading. As well as providing exclusive, iPad-only content, the app will also update with new content throughout each month.