GG Mag01

GG01 G r a p h i c G r o o v e T h e M a g a z i n e

STORM THORGERSON The man behind the most iconic images in the history of Rock and Roll.

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‘Wake Up and Smell the Coffee’ The Cranberries Storm Thorgerson - 2001

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Festival Paredes de Coura 2011 Dobra - Design Studio

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INDEX

David Pearson Interview Pag.6 Storm Thorgerson Pag.10 Dobra / Design Studio Pag.6

EDITORIAL editor-chefe/publisher

André Seabra - seabra233@gmail.com

co-editor/publisher

André Seabra - seabra233@gmail.com

Revisor

André Seabra - seabra233@gmail.com

Contact

contact@ggmagazine.net colabore/submit 5

DAVID PEARSON We spoke to the london-based graphic designer David Pearson who specializes in book design and branding.

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Please could you tell us briefly about your background?

What’s the thing you enjoy most about book design?

I studied at central saint martins in london and during a work placement in my second year (with phaidon), I fell in love with book design. from that point on, I tried to pin down a job within the industry and on graduation, began working as a text designer for penguin (setting the insides of books) before moving over to covers a year later. I worked in-house there for five years and have worked on my own for the seven years since.

Book cover design is one of the few design disciplines where ambiguity is actively encouraged. by holding back information and being quietly suggestive readers are invited to fill in the blanks and interpret for themselves. as far as I can see, there aren’t too many other situations where we are invited to engage with what we see and in turn, form meaningful connections with imagery.

How would you describe your style?

It is certainly revivalist, which is another way of saying that I steal from the past. typography is almost always the main ingredient and this, along with a limited colour palette, tends to give my work a unified look.

What’s been the biggest singular influence on your work?

Penguin books but more specifically, the designers that have worked there over the years. whether it is the clarity and the directness of derek birdsall’s work, david pelham’s dual-aspect, smile-in-the-mind covers or hans schmoller’s meticulous and elegant typography, the company and its employees have informed most of what I do.

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Which project has given you the most satisfaction so far?

Both penguin by design and the great ideas series. they were both jobs that I was allowed to oversee as a junior, which was such a thrill and a testament to the trusting environment at penguin. also, both felt like formative jobs in terms of what I have done since. the great ideas series (which eventually ran to one hundred books) represents several years’ work and so forms a kind of visual history of my career so far.

What areas of your work are you hoping to explore in the next year?

I am trying to develop closer relationships with type designers so that I can gain a better understanding of how type comes to be, so hopefully, I can use it more sensitively.

What do you know now, that you wish you knew when you left college?

Sadly, when I was studying I didn’t have the strength of character to realize what a crock of shit this type of comment was: ‘only bad designers use more than one/two/ three typefaces’. I now teach and see so many students similarly crippled by such sentiments; scared to even begin experimenting for fear they won’t be taken seriously. any typeface can be a fit for something. the most important thing is the spirit with which it is used and for young minds to be hobbled by such nonsense frustrates me no end.

Do you think it’s important to be able to draw as a designer?

I still think that sketching is the quickest way of generating and canceling-out ideas but I must admit to doing it less-and-less these days. I seem to now draw mostly when drunk and trying to make people laugh.

I also draw for sport: my girlfriend and I enjoy trying to capture gareth southgate’s likeness and try to out-do each other whenever he appears on TV. gareth represents a unique challenge in that his face points in several different directions at the same time.

What do you do to keep your ideas fresh?

Fear plays a substantial role when it comes to moving my work on. fear that people will suddenly get bored or accuse me of regurgitating. when you use typography as your sole form of expression, repetition can very quickly become an issue.

What compels you to design and what other compulsions do you have?

DP: aside from it being the only thing I can do (I am a failed footballer + window cleaner) I have an innate desire to make some sort of visual sense of things. unfortunately, this spills into all areas of my life and can mean that I spend half a day categorizing spare buttons.

Do you have any superstitious beliefs?

None whatsoever. I won’t leave a knife in the fork drawer, but I suspect this is more down to OCD than a belief in the supernatural.

What’s the last thing that made you say ‘wow’?

I love spin’s poster for last year’s giacometti exhibition (at fundación PROA). I really wish I’d done that.

" When you use typography as your sole form of expression, repetition can very quickly become an issue"

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STORM THORGERSON

The man behind the most iconic images in the history of Rock and Roll.

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Storm on Black Sabbath album,Technical Ecstasy

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" ART IS ABOUT FLIGHTS OF THE IMAGINATION, AND IF ART DOES SOMETHING TO PEOPLE, THEN I'M PRETTY UNPRINCIPLED WHEN IT COMES TO PUTTING A PRICE ON IT. YOU GIVE IT, I'LL SPEND IT. " Storm Thorgerson was born in 1944 in Potters Bar Middx. He attended Summerhill free school and then Brunswick primary Cambridge. Later he completed a BA Hons in English and Philosophy from Leicester University followed by a MA in film and TV from the Royal College of Art in London, graduating in 1969.

While he had initially dreamed of being a filmmaker, a chance invitation from some old school mates, namely Syd Barrett and Roger Waters of The Pink Floyd to do a cover for their Saucerful of Secrets, instantly changed his focus from film to graphic arts. Soon after, in 1970, he was invited to do a cover for Atom Heart Mother another Pink Floyd release for which his newly formed design company, Hipgnosis, formed with friend Aubrey Powell (Po) proposed the image of a cow looking back at the camera in a vivid green pasture with a light blue sky. The record company, EMI, absolutely hated it, but the band loved it and thus history was made.

Three years later Hipgnosis designed the prism for Dark Side of the Moon and truly made a name for themselves in the world of album cover art.

From those early days with Pink Floyd, Thorgerson has branched out to work with an incredibly

worthy group of artists. Always looking to push the envelope his works often feature impossibly large statues, floating objects and incredibly strange combinations of items. He prides himself on using very little computer enhancement to real photographs. Most of the artwork, incredibly, is real. For example, the gentleman on fire for Floyd’s album Wish You Were Here is actually on fire and the giant eyeball on The Cranberry’s Bury the Hatchet cover was a fiberglass model built and carried to an expanse of Monument Valley, Arizona.

Even the seven hundred wrought iron beds featured on Floyd’s A Momentary Lapse of Reason were “individually arranged” and “carefully spaced” on the beach four hours outside of London. Clearly the imagination of Storm Thorgerson knows no bounds.

He is willing to sweat, strain and fight for the perfect location, weather and overall effect of the art. He is willing to erect dozens of telephone poles in a neat line, carefully sitting real human models on top of each pole for the art. This type of dedication and open thinking is what keeps art fresh, new and exciting and is what every designer, be it graphic, digital or otherwise should strive to achieve.

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Here you can see a selection of Storm most notorious works.

Led Zeppelin Presence The curious object that adorned the cover photo and inside cover art of Presence has inspired much debate and speculation over the years (especially on 4/20, we don’t doubt.) Apparently it was meant to represent the “force and presence” of Led Zeppelin, which is all very well, but doesn’t explain why the respectable family in the above photo look like they’re about to have it for dinner. (Amusingly, Thorgerson was originally also hired to do the Houses of the Holy cover, but his original design, which featured a tennis racket, didn’t go down well with the band, who felt he was implying that their music was… yes, a racket.)

The Mars Volta Frances the Mute

Thorgerson was responsible for the sleeves of The Mars Volta’s first two records — the strikingly weird De-Loused in the Comatorium is perhaps the more eye-catching at first glance, but there’s something enduringly fascinating about this enigmatic image.

It seems to demand further analysis — why the hood? Why the old car? Does the fact that both drivers are wearing weird red hoods imply that everyone is? As a simple piece of design it’s pretty great, too — the symmetry, the colors, the use of the car roof to leave space for the album title.

Pink Floyd Wish You Were Here

Biffy Clyro Puzzle

You could choose plenty of Floyd’s sleeves here, but it’s hard to go past this one — two men, shaking hands on an empty street… and one of them is on fire. Unlike some of Thorgerson’s more inscrutable sleeves, the symbolism here is writ large — the album contained two tracks (“Have a Cigar” and “Welcome to the Machine”) cataloguing the band’s unease about the music industry, and the image has a definite implication of shaking hands with the devil.

This is one of Thorgerson’s more literal sleeve designs, reflecting both the album title and its lyrical themes of life being a puzzle that you piece together as you go along. The somewhat morose air of the artwork — especially the pose struck by puzzle man — also echoes the album’s lyrical content, and specifically singer Simon Neil’s grief over the death of his mother.

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Pink Floyd The Dark Side of the Moon And finally, the classic. Given that most of Thorgerson’s designs are essentially anthropocentric, or at least figurative, The Dark Side of the Moon represented quite a departure from his norma style. The result, though, was one of the single most recognizable (and parodied) sleeves ever conceived.

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dobra

The designers who like to work with cool people Give the image a lot of music, but do not stop there. JoĂŁo Guedes and AndrĂŠ Cruz - responsible for the image of Optimus Primavera Sound in 2013 and 2014 - opened the workshop Fold in Porto. "We are interested in working with cool people," said

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The designer André Cruz designed the image of the 2013 edition of Optimus Primavera Sound associated with the image of “ tangram “ , a Chinese puzzle with seven pieces . Was there representing the seven musical notes , seven pieces to be overlapping , as told in an earlier interview P3 . This year keeps signing the graphic identity of the festival , with a language that is more comfortable : “ minimalism with a bit of rock and roll to the mix .” “ The tangram is there, the logo originated in the tangram pieces ,” explains the designer . “ I continued to use the tool , but I was not me out there . “

The idea for the identity of the third edition of Optimus Primavera Sound - what happens 5-7 June in Porto - “ relies a little ( ... ) the strange unidentified object invades Park City during the festival days , “with scenes , trucks and thousands of people , “ without prejudice . “ The tendency was for the “ flat colors “ - yellow was used much - contrasting the purity of the City Park. Contrary to what was decided in 2013, when Andrew was responsible for the image of the festival in Porto and Barcelona, this ​​ year only worked for the event of the Portuguese city. “ I sought the image ripen ,” says.

2014 is also the year that Andrew joins friend and colleague John Guedes in the creation of a joint project at the Port . “It’s a story of friendship ,” the workshop of the Fold , says André , one half of the duo. Were college classmates at the School of Art & Design ( ESAD ) Matosinhos and since then worked together in parallel to the main occupations previous projects - the first collaboration to four the cover of “ Groove Junkies “ , the Portuguese Hipnoise Cool , was hands .

“ The aim was to open a studio and make our lives better , it seemed perfectly natural ,” says John , 32 .

Have a band shared the Sizo , and have even shared house. Wanted to have a space to be able to do the kind of design that pleases them most . The motto is given : “ We are interested in working with cool people. “

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Give picture to music

In the list of customers with whom the two friends have worked , individually or in pairs , there are several well-known names in the field of culture : National Theatre of Saint John , Lovers and Lollipops & Publisher Dafne , in the case of John ; Casa da Musica , Biennale Cerveira and Paredes de Coura Festival , where André .

Music has been present for many years in a relationship “ little thought “ that “ came naturally “ , describes Andrew. Table Bent [ acting in OPS June 7 ] and Watermark are some of the bands with whom have collaborated . Give “picture music “ as André sets , and this can happen in both album covers and posters for festivals . In the production phase, with the signing Dobra is the solo project of the singer of Portuguese Glockenwise , Duchess , edited by Lovers & Lollipops . The development of the graphic identity of Matosinhos Jazz Orchestra is another project at hand .

“ We know a lot of people because we had a cool band and this led to these people also sympathized with us and realized we were doing other things besides music . So also in collaborations began asking in the visual area , “recalls the designer of 33 years. “ I never thought I would be in this area to make pictures of the bands or festivals , I thought I would be on stage . “

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‘Houses of the Holy’ Led Zeppelin Storm Thorgerson - 1973

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