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Saturday, 17 November 2012
Independents: Design in a Fine Art Context .(scribbled at 23:11 )
I think I’m getting into the
flow of updates again (partially because my laptop has taken to sporadically
switching itself off at random intervals, so I’m trying to rush through this
post before it occurs again)… before spending a few hours with Daido Moriyama
and William Klein shows at Tate Modern Friday before last, I spent a weekend
away up north. Well, the Midlands, if we’re feeling finicky. I’d booked a place
at the ‘Independents: Design in a Fine Art Context’ symposium conceived by Ikon
Gallery, and hosted at the Birmingham Institute of Art & Design on Margaret
Street. At a mere fiver
for a ticket, I could justify trekking up from London for it.
Introduced and lead by Simon
Taylor (head of Learning at Ikon), the event mainly targeted how Art and Design
relate to one another. As we all sat together, he explained that BIAD was an
ideal location to discuss such a huge topic; this stunning Venetian Gothic
building that was actually purpose built for the study of art and design back
in the mid nineteenth century. Questions probed at us varied from ‘is there a
hierarchy between design and art’ to ‘what actually is the fundamental
difference between these two in today’s world?’ In recent years times have
changed and now we find ourselves in a world where the line between art and
design grows increasingly thin.
This has been prevalent for
Ikon in the past too. Take their 2010 event which coincided with their Donald
Judd exhibition, relating to whether or not Design can be considered as Art.
Unlike the typical box-like forms that Judd is cited for in all the art history
books, Ikon chose to display a series of his lesser known… furniture.
Nonetheless, A Good Chair is a Good Chair
was my favourite show that I saw that year- it was eye opening to see how
Artists can adopt different practices and succeed in them. Okay, so Judd’s
pared down minimalist wooden chairs weren’t exactly ergonomically sound, but
they sure were interesting to see in the white cube context. Likewise, we
should consider the retrospective of Tony Arefin’s graphic design that Ikon
exhibited more recently (the show finished the following day after the
symposium). Curated by designer James Langdon, Arefin & Arefin explores the work of a man who fundamentally,
took over the art world with his acerbic colours, bold typography and purist
approach to graphic design. From making it as creative director of I.D Magazine
to working closely with Damien Hirst to working on a campaign for Nike, Arefin
was a genius (I’m sorry, I know that
word gets overused a lot.)
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| Image: Copyright of Phaidon |
So have Ikon been somewhat
rebellious in choosing to display the work of a graphic designer in a fine art
gallery? I’m not saying that this is unheard of altogether (take the V&A’s
exhibition on British Design earlier this year for instance) but I think that
to a certain extent, putting the works of Arefin and Judd in a space devoted to
contemporary art is a paradigm for the fluidity between these two different
strands of our cultural heritage.
Which brings me back to the
symposium again. The first speaker of the afternoon was Vaughan Oliver, a
graphic designer whose work has been predominantly based within the music
industry. Vaughan worked with alternative rock bands Throwing Muses and Pixies,
amongst numerous others in his time spent leading many a design project at the
record label 4AD. Vaughan spoke
extensively about the idea of ‘text as image’ as well as the need for audience
awareness during the execution of a design. Before I forget I should mention
actually how engaging his talk was, which resulted in me taking barely any
notes throughout the entirety of his talk. As well as expelling masses of
charisma, Vaughan is incredibly witty too. Even after a technical glitch with
the projector, Vaughan was able to capture the entire audience immediately with
his inspiring words aimed at those pursuing such a career in graphic design.
Insisting that aesthetic style is everything, and telling everyone to pick up
influences from everywhere and above
all, to go against what’s trending now, Vaughan had aptly laid the foundations
for the final speaker of the event, Kate Moross.
Ah, Kate Moross. If there ever
was a paradigm for those youthful entrepreneurs that you occassionally read
about and inevitably envy a wee bit, it’s her. I got a little excited on my tube ride into
work on Tuesday morning as I flicked through Time Out Magazine’s 100 Most
Influential People in the Arts feature, and spotted an entry dedicated to
Moross. From leading a design campaign for Cadbury’s to actually taking over
the Topshop in Oxford Circus with her brilliant illustrations, there is very
little that this 26 year old Londoner can’t do.
Yes, she’s only 26! Before my impending jealously kicks in, I must admit that
achieving all of this by your mid-twenties is pretty inspirational, ouaih?
That said, it’s also become a saddening reminder of my ever dwindling youth; I anticipate that even when I’m thirty I’ll still be breaking even every month.
Like Vaughan’s practice, Kate’s
work has been heavily involved with the music industry. Although describing her
work as ‘slapdash’, her career in London has been continually growing since
2006. Most of Kate’s work is commercial, finding it best to work to a structure
and project brief. And she also describes herself as having an ‘obsession with
3 sided shapes’, which is quite evident by looking at her fabulous array of
clothing and jewellery. I spotted this on her website earlier, which uses apretty awesome monochrome geometric pattern:
Talking about her career when
it first took off (at Camberwell College), Moross explained that working in
London and New York has had a significant impact on her life and practice, and
this was during a time when she states that “everyone
had a MySpace. Everyone needed a brand”. She gives words character, but
emphasises the ideas for pattern, texture and colour. Before showing us
photographs of Studio Moross where
she and her design team are based, Kate spoke a little more about her
experiences of university.
Although explaining that her
design practice was received as quite unorthodox during her years at
Camberwell, she said that it was during that those years that she learnt most.
Well, indirect learning anyway. About
life, herself, and her own work. After being approached by Cadbury’s in her
second year to design one of their Glass
and a Half Production campaigns (which she then went on to use as her final
art college project), her work then took her to New York… for an entire year.
With her skipping between PowerPoint
slides almost instantaneously, I guess I’m finding it difficult to coherently
write about what she said. It was all pretty powerful, and although Kate speaks
at a fairly fast pace about her practice, her words were methodical and concise…
a bit like her work, I suppose. There’s this sense of spontaneity with her,
almost as if you can feel her getting bored if she spoke about a project for a
great length of time. Even her anecdote about her collaboration with Topshop
didn’t last longer than a few minutes. Again, for such a huge corporate brand,
she spoke about it matter-of-factly. How she’d agreed to take over the window
display on Topshop in Oxford Circus, but had no idea what medium she could even
draw onto the glass surface surface with until a night or so before she began
work. To me, that’s not disorganisation, that’s ballsy.
Asked by a design student in the audience if they too, should adopt her extreme prolificacy and try out everything, Kate’s response was simple; she explained that although she’d designed everything from clothing to record labels, there needs to be a great emphasis on honing your skills and concentrating on a particular area before even thinking about moving on. That said, nothing should be disregarded either, because saying ‘no’ to anything doesn’t get you a job designing trainers for Adidas and being Jessie Ware’s art director, does it?
I went for a quick wander
around the Tony Arefin and Yael Bartana shows at Ikon shortly afterwards, the
former of which blew me away a little at first sight. Entering the upper
gallery, there seemed to almost be a ricochet of colours and text everywhere.
It looked bloody brilliant.
Birmingham adventures were then
topped off by a night spent dancing along to Madness at the Yardbird, fuelled
by Cherry Pie and a glass or 4 of shiraz too many.
I may have fallen.
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| Yael Bartana at Ikon Gallery |
Labels: ART DESIGN AND ARCHITECTURE, Cadburys, Cherry Pie, Design Art Crossover, Design Symposium, Ikon Gallery, Kate Moross, Margaret Street Birmingham, Tony Arefin, Topshop, Vaughan Oliver
