You simply need to watch this stop animation video! Everyone of us has the tools necessary to create this animation, a paint brush, a camera and iMovie. What makes this animation special was the imagination used to dream the idea, not the tools. So next time you get caught up in software, go back and watch this video!
Graphic designers are caught up in a media stream that is very wide and fast, but not very deep. The only way to navigate in it is to go faster or slower than the stream. To go faster, you must be at the forefront of technology and fashion, both of which are changing at an unprecedented rate. To go slower, you need an understanding of context through history and theory. Graphic designers are predisposed to go faster or slower according to their experience and inclination, but mostly they are getting swept along in the currents of pop mediocrity.
Go to the web site Ready Made and take a look at this current project five illustrators have undertaken to create contemporary versions of the posters created under Roosevelt’s Federal Art Project in response to the Great Depression.
The next time you see a sixteen-color, blind-embossed, gold-stamped, die-cut, elaborately folded and bound job, printed on handmade paper, see if it isn’t a mediocre idea trying to pass for something else.
So what’s in it for you?
At the end of each month there will be a signed copy of the book, Mail Me Art: Going Postal with the World’s Best Illustrators and Designers, plus an art-related prize given away to the artist of our favourite submission for that month. We are also hoping that there will be a follow up book and if there are enough submissions we will run another exhibition. As before, artists will receive 70% from the sale of their mail art, less any gallery commission incurred. Money from the book and/or sponsorship will be used to cover the cost of organizing and hiring the gallery; artists will not be asked to contribute to the cost of the exhibition. Click here to see photos from the Mail Me Art exhibition held in April 2009 in London.
How to submit your mail art
Mail Me Art 2 will run for around 6-8 months. For more information about the project, please click here. If you’re after some inspiration, you can see examples of work from the first Mail Me Art project here.
The Swatch Young Illustrators Award is a unique competition awarding creativity and innovation in personal contemporary illustration and graphics. The award encourages and supports designers in their artistic practice and offers an international and worldwide recognized platform to them. Illustrative art works, art projects with graphic influences, animations and book art objects qualify for submission.
The nominees of the Swatch Young Illustrators Award will be invited to Berlin and get the opportunity to exhibit their work at Illustrative 2009 in Berlin. The winners await prizes worth 6.000 Euros as well as publications and illustration agency contracts and will also be featured in future international shows. One winner will be invited to design a Swatch Watch – a great opportunity to join the ranks of artists such as Kiki Picasso, Pedro Almodóvar, Robert Altman and Keith Haring.
Deadline
September 30th 2009
Eligiblity
Eligible applicants are illustrators, visual artists, graphic designers, animators, book artists, as well as students and apprentices. The minimum age is 21 years. A maximum age doesn’t exist, despite the name of the competition.
Submission Fee
Extended payment deadline: A submission fee of 30 EUR or $48 US for administrative purposes must be transferred or paid online via Paypal before September 29th, 2009.
Chen Design is also busy working on a follow up to Fingerprint: The Art of Using Handmade Elements in Graphic Design. Entries are free and the deadline is October 15, 2009. Download complete rules and entry form.
The Yellow Pages Advertising Challenge asks undergraduate students at two and four year U.S. and Canadian colleges/universities to create print and Internet Yellow Pages advertising for a Yellow Pages advertiser. The competition provides “real world” experience for students interested in pursuing an education and/or career in advertising, marketing, graphic design or a related field.
Beyond providing valuable experience, the competition is designed to reward and showcase excellence in student-created advertising. Competition winners will have their work displayed on the YPA Academic web site and the work will be honored at the YPA Annual Convention. In addition, competition winners and their faculty sponsors will share in nearly $10,000 in total prize awards.
The Assignment
Students entering the 2009 – 2010 competition will submit two Yellow Pages print ads and one Internet Yellow Pages ad for the Haven Bay Veterinary Hospital. Students can work alone or in teams of up to three, under the supervision of a faculty advisor. Multiple teams can enter from the same class or school and a faculty advisor can supervise more than one team. The entry can be worked-on during either the Fall (2009) and/or Spring (2010) semester, and may be the result of an in-class assignment. All entries must be received by April 23, 2010.
If you have any questions, please contact Dr. Joel Davis, the academic advisor to the competition, at competition@ypa-academics.org.
SEATTLE – The Seattle Post-Intelligencer, which has chronicled the news of the city since logs slid down its steep streets to the harbor and miners caroused in its bars before heading north to Alaska’s gold fields, will print its final edition Tuesday.
Hearst Corp., which owns the 146-year-old P-I, said Monday that it failed to find a buyer for the newspaper, which it put up for a 60-day sale in January after years of losing money. Now the P-I will shift entirely to the Web.
You can read the rest of the article here.
The HOW Poster Design Awards are back! There are no categories, and it doesn’t matter if your poster was created for yourself, for work or just for fun…we want to see what you can do! So take this wide-open media and run with it—then make sure you submit your work to us by December 1!
The Deadline
Work must have been created between July 1, 2008 and Dec.1, 2009. Each entry is $30. All entries must be submitted online no later than December 1, 2009. Entries submitted after Dec. 1 require a late fee of $10 per entry. Entries will not be accepted after December 15, 2009.