Guest Lecturers

Notes from guest lecturers. All of these lecturers were interesting as it gave a really good insight to a range of things they do in the 'real world' of art. 

Olivier Kugler

• German Illustrator
• Started out in the military 
• Reportage Illustrator

A big part of his work focused in refugee camps

• Collected the content for his work from interviews with people there
• Many photographs of the spaces and people
• Rough sketches and rough notes to help inform the development of the work

Artwork starts as sketches and then develops further

• Scans sketches and begins to work on them digitally

Main focus of the artwork in the refugee camp was to raise awareness of regress circumstances

Clients - Have work for the Guardian regularly. 

Figure 1 - Oliver Kugler reportage illustration

Figure 2 - Oliver Kugler reportage illustration

This is the first time I had looked at this style of illustration. Oliver Kugler was very interesting and had a lot of relevant and interesting stories to tell about his work and how he gets to travel the world and do what he loves. Reportage is a style that is very expressive, requires interviews and includes a lot of writing. It was interesting to hear the way in which he worked by making small sketches, interviewing people and taking lots of photographs and actually producing majority of his work away from location. The idea of travelling with your art is exciting and something that I had never thought about. From this lecture, over the summer period, I will make an effort to explore this style of illustration and see if I can start to include it into my visual language and put my own twist on it. 

Papio Press

• Studied at the University of Gloucestershire 
• A couple that started their company in second year of university.  
• Sell on Etsy

Started with pocket mirrors paying £50 for them and they were extremely popular. Now sell prints, notebooks and stationary.

• Design their products around a theme - animals, jungles, leaves etc
• Just those two within the business and have to do everything themselves. Classed as self-publishing. Advantageous as they have control over everything

- Branding

- Photography

- Accounting

- Social Media

- Customer service

- Wholesale

- Ordering packaging

- Website

- Blogging

- Sourcing

- Promotion

- Craft fairs

• To the custom items they is no 'secret' to what they use. They Googled other companies and the ones that have been successful and reliable and most cost effective they ahem stuck with.
• Combine making and illustration to make interesting products. 

Figure 3 - Papio Press

This was one of the most interesting and relevant lectures that I feel I have had.  I already followed Papio Press on Instagram and loved their designs, and not knowing their relationship with the University. The fact they started their business in second year and being on the same course that I am on now really puts into perspective that you can have a business and it be successful. Because they are self-publishers they are in-charge of every aspects of their business which, whilst challenging, means they have complete control over everything to do with the business. They touched on the fact that if you really want something you can put a small amount of money to it and promote yourself and work really hard you can get it and get to where you want. It was nice to see that they have been so successful in their own company and this is something I have always thought about doing, not as a full time job, but something on the side that I enjoy and hope to maintain. 

Paul Farrell 

• Self-emloyed, 50
• Graphic designer for 20 years - illustrator, printmaker and designer based in Bristol
• Started off making stationary and christmas cards
• Wanted to be a book illustrator and previously has created a series of work based on counties of Britain - this inspired the idea for his book
• 'Great Britain in colour - published September 2016 - produced in Japan as the book was a lot cheaper to make and be produced there.
• 'Less in more' - basic shapes and images to make more digestible for viewer and easier to convey the message. - breaking down images into bare components.

Digital proof - Lithography

• Colour on screen different to being printed on paper, some colours aren't as he wanted in the book. 
• Colour absorption into paper making colours less vivid.

Paper stock 

• Wanted thicker paper that wouldn't show images on reverse side through, didn't want to spoil each image on each page
• Front cover has a matte finish - thinking about the children market and not getting sticky fingers on the front of the book cover.

'I got to work and have a holiday'

• All his work is personal to him and his the memories of the holiday within each image. 

Figure 4 - Paul Farrell - Great Britain In Colour

It was another different lecture that was still of great interest. I had recently for another module started to work graphically and digitally using flat shapes and colours which is the exact way in which Paul Farrell was working. He said how much he loved Great Britain and how it has a lot to show for itself in term of culture and I too love our country and have visited many places within it. When he was talking about the book and showing us some pages, I instantly connected with the images and they brought back some memories of places that I have been and still go now. The fact I had such a strong connection to these images made me think about wanting to include this kind of emotional connection with the audience to my work and how I would in fact do that. He was very lovely and very inspiring. Since his talk I follow him on all of his social media platforms and enjoy scrolling through his work. 

Reference

- Figure 1 - 2 - Olivier Kugler's Portfolio - 1_Muhamed_Tea_Vendor". Olivierkugler.com.

- Figure 3 - Beautiful Illustrated Stationery / Notebooks Notepads & Artists Prints". Papio Press.

- Figure 4 -"Great Britain In Colour - Paul Farrell". Paul-farrell.co.uk.

Bibliography 

- "Beautiful Illustrated Stationery / Notebooks Notepads & Artists Prints". Papio Press. N.p., 2017. Web. 8 May 2017.

- "Great Britain In Colour - Paul Farrell". Paul-farrell.co.uk. N.p., 2017. Web. 8 May 2017.

- "Olivier Kugler's Portfolio - 1_Muhamed_Tea_Vendor". Olivierkugler.com. N.p., 2017. Web. 8 May 2017.