Cut and Paste Artists

Eduardo Recife
http://www.misprintedtype.com/

I’m a long time fan of Eduardo Recife and am greatly influenced by his vintage styled collages and illustrations. I find he works minimally, layering one central figure over textured and aged papers. I think this is most effective with his tendency to cover or block his figures eyes, which seems to de-personify or censor their identity, so they become a generic being.

Elisabeth Archipoff
http://www.romanticsurf.com/

Because she freelances for fashion house campaigns, Elisabeth Archipoff’s collages are always a landscape of beautiful girls and soft colour palettes. I like her works because they have a kind of dreamy narrative about them.

Caco Neves


Hannah Hoch


Designed Memory
http://www.designedmemory.com/

Design Memory do web design with a distinct cut paste collage style. I love their work for Au Revoir Simone, it has the feel of a hand made scrap book.

Conversations with Strangers

I was stuck on Warhol's "Isn't life just a series of images that change as they repeat themselves?" so I asked strangers on http://www.omegle.com/ with some interesting results:

You: isn't life just a series of images that change as they repeat themselves?

Stranger: i think thats contradictory
Stranger: because how can something change as it repeats itself
Stranger: it either repeats or changes, not both

Stranger: i don't agree with that statement
Stranger: well its wrong basically...human experience is a series of images yes. but it doesnt make sense to say they change as they repeat themselves, does it?
Stranger: repitition and change are virtual opposites
Stranger: and the way in which ur average person takes in life is through images and responses to those images
Stranger: assuming they arent blind

Stranger: no
Stranger: you feel stuff too
Stranger: and smell
Stranger: and hear

Stranger: that's right but it should be a nice imagez

Stranger: well
Stranger: if ur refering to evolution then yeah
Stranger: definitely

Stranger: because life is to continue the next generation
Stranger: it technically has no real purpose

Stranger: what do you think the significance of life brings to the universe?

Stranger: nothing

Stranger: do u know the resolution of the human retina?
Stranger: lets say you're looking at purple light
Stranger: its about 7000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000
Stranger: i dont think an image has ever repeated itself
Stranger: ever
Stranger: anywhere

Stranger: which means its not so much repitition as familiarity maybe?

Stranger: or association

Stranger: it's pretty straightforward, but i don't agree with it
Stranger: from Warhols perspective, you know, the scene he was into, yeah, that was pretty damn repetetive

Stranger: but, that's what sort of art he was into, you know
Stranger: he made pieces that were indistinguishable from reality
connection imploded

Versatile Family Album

I collect other people's family photos. I like seeing the way people grow, act and change through a photo album. I like the saturated tones and the rounded yellowed corners. I find, especially in older eras, generic patterns forming in the staging of photos. There's always someone holding the baby, at a wedding, the family at christmas, arranged on the couch; and then there's the holiday snaps; posed in front of a monument, on the beach, in the snow. I find it quite heartwarming that you can observe similarities between your family and a complete strangers, and yet quite ridiculous that these generic set ups can apply to any family. Until fairly recently, cameras were considered a luxury and only brought out to capture the special moments, like weddings, family holidays and so on, thus the family album becomes somewhat of a constructed reality, representing specific events, only half of the story.

I guess this is the first concept that sprung to mind with Andy Warhol's quote: Isn't life just a series of images that change as they repeat themselves?
and although, "life" is much more than just a family photo album, I think an album tries to record and depict family life. And the images in any album certainly change, and tend to repeat themselves through the life cycle of each generation.

Ex 3: Pop Art Postcard

DIS1103
digital processes for art and design

EXERCISE 3: POP ART POSTCARD (15%)

Brief “Isn't life a series of images that change as they repeat themselves?” ANDY WARHOL

Using Photoshop, illustrate the above quote in a Pop Art/photo-collage inspired postcard.

Consider the works of early dada photo-collage artists John Heartfield, Aleksandr Rodchenko, Hannah Hoch; and pop artists such as Andy Warhol, Richard Hamilton and Robert Raushenberg.

Method:
1. Research the history and techniques of Pop Art and photomontage.
2. Scan and/or copy images for import into Photoshop (in the spirit of Pop Art feel free to use images from a variety of sources)
3. Design the dada postcard at the standard DL envelope size (220mm x 110mm, 300dpi – use the preset in Photoshop) in either portrait or landscape format

Objectives:
• basic use of Photoshop type and selection tools
• exploration of photomontage

Criteria:
1. technical proficiency (5)
2. design elements and principles (5)
3. content [appropriate response to the brief] (5)

Deadline: Week 9 (4-8 May)

折り紙チェス

I'm pretty happy with this and I can see a lots of my influences coming through in the final design. Although it's nothing like the white bone china sculpted pieces I'd first imagined, I'd say I've achieved my objectives: the pieces are unique and yet they clearly belong to a set, with an apparent hierarchy, are invertible vector outlines which are reminiscent of origami forms. The use of solid and dotted line creates the illusion of raised and recessed folds of paper. I think it's important to recognise that the pieces, although physically implausible, are heavily rooted in the suggestion of form and dimension through geometry. The Origami Chess set is an ideational structure, realised in shape and line.

Playing with the chess set

Although I haven't formally looked at the colour palette I have found that a scheme has naturally developed through my design process. Here are my observations of colour:
*toxic green - recurring colour that followed from initial idea development when i was ori-tracing
*light blue - even before toxic green i was using blue lines to trace and create geometric forms
*warm grey/green - came as an alternative to black which was too stark against other hues, but knowing i had to keep it black and white, selected a nearest black replacement.

I used my creative intuition to place the chess pieces in a roughly symmetrical composition, balancing it with light and dark coloured pieces, and still in a scattered-on-the-chess-board arrangement. I repeated some of the smaller pieces (pawn, knight, rook) and featured the King and Queen once each, featuring them strongly on the forefont, while the other pieces are at the hands of the players.

Text

So i'm going to trust google translate and tell you that 折り紙チェス means "origami chess" in Japanese, and is the natural choice of title for my chess set poster. And instead of selecting an appropriate font I've chosen to take this contrast all the way and create a 'hand-drawn' title in order to eliminate any super-hard edges which might detract attention from the intended focus; the origami chess set.
Some arranging + sizing =