Vivien Capper

Hello. My name’s Vivien and I’m from the beautiful county of Kent, England though currently living and working near Rome in delightful Italy with its exciting, lively way of life and vibrant colours and designs .

I started out as an artist developing Indian ink artwork of a variety of subjects especially figurative artwork and abstract floral designs, then progressed into creative photography and digital artistry thanks to Sebastian Michael’s courses at ‘Photoshop Artistry’ and the advanced courses ‘Awake’ & ‘Kaizen’. My inspiration is drawn from my love of nature, figurative artwork and Italian design and I love using many textures, patterns and colours.

This month I’ve again tried doing something a bit different in my artwork and have created variation on two pieces applying different colour tones.

The following text is the reason behind the artwork created by James Hurley on page 33 of this months magazine.

This is a rough transcript of an internal conversation with myself: Growing up in the world these days isn’t as fun or carefree as it used to be. It is very easy to pick up bad habits and end up following the “crowd” and losing your own individuality. Its very easy to fall into the routine of watching TV, streaming programmes and “living” your life on social media, the web or YouTube. Its very easy to let your imagination and creativity get pushed back into the dark corners of your self conscious and to begin to forget your own dreams and start to rely on “canned laughter” and fake video clips to tell you whats fun and what you should be doing.

By all means take advantage of the web for entertainment, but dont rely on it. Dont make the web your sole source of contact with the outside world, dont believe whats in front of your eyes, because mostly its there to lead you in a specific direction and set you in a specific mindset. Social acceptance is a very powerful marketing tool and the web is populated with millions of “Social Traps” aimed at capturing your interest and getting you “hooked” on content.

Just think about it, that video showing that box of money they just found inside the wall of their new house yesterday was a setup, that key that magically led them to a safe buried under a shed in their back garden the next day was a set up. How many things can one person magically find before you realise its a video made just to get you to watch their content. Don’t forget, views of videos make the creator money, the more views they get the more money they make. So see it for what it is, see that you are spending 6 hours a day or more watching made up stories showing things that don’t actually happen but that you are accepting as real and see that you are making money for the creator. Don’t be a sheep, don’t let someone else’s stories dull your imagination, don’t be the same as everyone else, be YOU, let your mind wander and don’t just accept what people tell you is reality.

Follow YOUR dream, make YOUR own reality. See online content for what it is, entertainment to fill the gaps, BUT not to take over your life, don’t fall into the “Social Trap”. Be the creator of YOUR own story, don’t become a heart icon mixed in with ten thousand other identical heart icons. Don’t lose sight of YOUR individual spark.

James Hurley - Photo Artist / Magazine Editor

If you enjoyed this issue, follow the link below and check out the previous months magazines. Each one is packed full of photo-art made especially for you.