fon·i·ca Noun
A non-profit organisation that puts out a product of quality that is intended to inspire and nurture creavtivitvy in today’s youth. The 6 Bi-monthly printed issues and website will host a range of interesting articles, interviews with industry professionals and showcase work from talented up comers. The printed product will be entirely free to pick up by anyone with an interest in Art and Design.
Design is the application of intent - the opposite of happenstance, and an antidote to accident. — Robert L. Peters
Contents Interview Interview with Yorkshire based painter Stephen Dixon
Packaging The new Devo album is put under the microscope for this months packaging section
Video TV Advert Carousel is our chosen video this month
CMYK Color Chart A fully printed CMYK color chart laid out to use as a guide for printing
Hermann Obrist A look at the work of Hermann Obrist and a documented visit to an exhibition of his work
Lomography An article covering the reto look of Lomography
Stephen Dixion
A new painter has arrived on the Yorkshire art scene, based in Leeds; Stephen Dixon is an up and coming painter who specializes in capturing the beautiful Yorkshire landscape and small town living. We managed to catch him for a quick interview and see what his current plans are, how he approaches a new piece of work and what he has in mind for the future.
When do you find time to paint? Having to work six days a week means it can be hard to find time to paint as much I would like. I tend to paint in my front room on an evening. Sometimes I paint till the early hours of the morning and find it hard to stop, when the works flowing it’s hard to put the brush down, but I know there is a time when I have to pull my self away.
When did you start painting? I started to paint back in September 2009. Before I started painting I used to draw. I first started with watercolor paints and since then moved onto oil paints.
Do you work on one painting at a time? I work on a number of paintings at a time really. So sometimes it can be a number of months until a painting starts to have a look of being finished.
Why paint? Ever since I was young I found art as my escape. I’ve always found reading and writing harder then most. So painting and drawing had put me as an equal in the classroom. I then found out just how much I loved it and it has stuck with me ever since.
What Are Your Methods To Approaching And Idea? I take a lot of photos, be that of an old phone box or streetlight. Then I have a number of photo references, which help with laying out what I want on the canvas. I also see what other artists have painted and get ideas from other peoples work, most people wouldn’t say that but I think it’s a good thing.
Does living in Yorkshire influence your work? In a round about way I think it has to, we take in little bits of our surroundings each day. I’ve lived in Yorkshire all my life so I like to paint things I live around. I also like other Yorkshire artists, who I’m sure have influences from the county.
When do you know a painting is finished? I find this hard to be honest. I have lots of paintings at home that are for the better part finished. The only thing is you always want to add to your work. As you paint you get a new idea and you add more and more. This is when a painting can be spoiled.
How far do you want your career to go? Well I would love my only career to be a painter; it is all I really want to do for a living. I see it as something that will happen just in its own time. What do you want your paintings to say? I don’t think it has to say anything at all. It’s nice when you see a painting and it makes you smile or it makes you feel like your there. Some artists have a big message in their art; I just try to have fun. I might look at doing a hidden message, just as soon as I can think of something to hide. How do you decide on the price of your work? I take into account what its cost to make, then how long it has taken to work on and if I feel it’s worth a good price. The main thing is to make sure I have money to keep on painting. The more you do something and practice the better you get, so I consider this a personal apprenticeship. Would you consider taking on commission work? I’d love any kind of commission work. I have to say it’s not something I’ve done in the past, as I tend to give a lot of paintings away. I’m happy at the moment just having my work seen.
Packaging It’s been 20 years since we last heard any new material from the leaders of de-evolution, but it’s been a wait worth while, with the new album being released as speak we took the time too check out the new album artwork and I must say, it impressed us. A beautiful shot of a woman putting one of the famous Devo power drones into her mouth as if it was a sweet. The heavy glossed over lips really draw you into the image and is nicely linked to the albums title “Something for Everybody”. The difference between this new album, compared to that of old ones, is that Devo opened up to their large fan base and allowed them to have creative input to not only the art work, but song mixes, colour schemes and the whole inner workings of the band, the band even went as far as to make the final track listing dependant on user feedback. Stating in interviews of how very insular they are as a group, it is a brave step to give up so much creative control to those who support you. Clearly though the bold step has paid off, as the band are receiving fantastic reviews on the album it self.
Video The video we have chosen to showcase this month is the TV advert Carousel, directed by Adam Berg and production left with London based company Stink Digital. This advert is for the new Philips Cinema 21:9 LCD Television, which is the worlds first TV to use a 7:3 aspect ratio, it is made to display films recorded in Cinemascope and the more modern anamorphic format. The video it self runs for 2minute 19 seconds and is one continuous shot through the scene of an armed robbery, the camera travels through a freeze frame of the event, starting with an armoured police van exploding. The camera then takes us through a gunfight in the doorway of a hospital, to the interior as we see more police officers and criminals fighting. The camera then moves past one of the clown wearing robbers kicking an officer through a glass panel to show two more people falling down from the first floor while fighting. We are then taken through a series of more explosions and gunfights as the camera moves in and out of the frozen action to show a clown throwing money from a bag and discarding his shotgun. The camera then moves through a room showing a murdered man and a number of police officers before we exit through
the broken window and back to the officer at the start of the video. Even though the ad plays out as one continuous shot its actually a collection of 7 shots stitched together, with 2 shots of each 7 sections being done, one at 50fps to help minimise extras movement being as noticeable and then a “clean� shot with all the extras and vehicles removed to help with post production. As well as viewing the advert you can also watch a short making of on YouTube if you search for Carousel. Despite shooting a heavy portion of the advert, a lot of post-production work still had to be done to produce the final product. A Stockholm based visual effects company called Redrum dealt with the 3D effects, the debris and muzzle flashes from the guns where separately created by Magoo Studios who used 3ds Max. Due to running time and high level of violence the makers decided not to show the advert on TV and instead set of a microsite to display it. When released it was a huge success and went on to win many awards including the Grand Prix in the film category at the Cannes Film Festival.
C0 M100 Y100 K30
C0 M48 Y100 K36
C0 M20 Y60 K25
C0 M10 Y50 K15
C0 M5 Y10 K25
C0 M5 Y10 K15
C100 M0 Y0 K0
C100 M0 Y100 K50
5/10% 20/30% 40/50% 60/70% 80/90% 100%
opacity settings
this colour chart is design to give you an idea of what CMYK colours look good on newsprint, the colour swatches have been broken down and a 10% decrease in opacity has been applied so you get a feeling the blend between the swatch colour and the colour of the newsprint.
Colour Chart
CMYK
C50 M100 Y0 K0
C100 M100 Y0 K0
C100 M50 Y0 K30
C0 M65 Y100 K0
C0 M25 Y100 K0
C50 M0 Y100 K0
C0 M0 Y0 K100
C0 M100 Y0 K0
C0 M100 Y100 K0
C100 M0 Y100 K0
C0 M50 Y0 K0
C0 M80 Y100 K50
Hermann Obrist
I recently visited the Henry Moore Institute in Leeds city centre to see the new Hermann Obrist Art Nouveau exhibition, which is running from June 3rd till August 29th. Having never heard or seen any work of Obrists, I visited the exhibition will mild expectations, I was greatly surprised to see a broad and varied collection of work from a highly acclaimed artist. Before entering the exhibition space I had been given leaflets filled with information on Obrist and his life and this helped when it came to looking through the artists work as it gave additional insight in to his methods and ideas. The pencil drawings that occupy the first room of the exhibition space where one of the highlights as they showed Obrists great eye for detail, they also convey the mans great knowledge of medicines as a majority of them are inspired by his love of nature. Reading through the notes you can I quickly learnt that Obrist loved the outdoors and would frequently collect plant samples and examine them, before recreating them in detailed pencilled drawings. Rare photographs and finished pieces from Obrists embroidery work are also present and offer great progress from his early sketches, the survival of these are pieces are a testament to Obrists daughter and her determination to preserve her fathers legacy as his Munich studio sustained heavy amounts of damage during WW2 bombings. As with the embroidery and sketches, there are a number of household items, furniture pieces that were crafted from wood, chest locks and tablecloths that stand in the middle of the first exhibition room.
While the sketches and samples of embroidery offer an interesting insight into Obrists fascination with nature and medicine, it is the plaster moulds of sculptures that take centre stage in the exhibition. They stand well spread out in the middle of the space allowing people to walk around view them from any angle. These pieces link in with the last room of the exhibition displaying Obrists move from illustrating and stitching to creating massive marble fountains, tombs and monuments. Unfortunately while reading through the exhibition leafleft I discovered
that the majority of these pieces were destroyed during bombings campaigns of World War 2 and were not saved. A few shards and rare pieces do however stand proudly in the exhibition next to photographs of the monuments in their complete and original state. Leaving the exhibition I felt that I had found a greater understanding of Obrist and what he believed in and what he created. To say I had merely visited the gallery on a whim, not knowing what I’d find, I have left after viewing some inspirational pieces of work.
Lomography
There is something extremely intimate and warm about Lomography. In each and every shot it seems to pull in every aspect of the world, bring it to the forefront and demand you take notice. Whether you are inside or out, whether it is sunny or cloudy, if you take a successful image it somehow seems to comfort and raise a smile. It was back in 1991 when two students from Vienna, Austria stumbled upon a unknown, unusual Russian camera, the Lomo Kompakt Automat, first manufactured almost a decade before. What started was an underground artistic experiment with an enigmatic weapon of photography, what it has become, and what it became fast, was a world wide phenomenon with millions wanting to get involved, leading to the mass manufacture of the Lomo LCA, and in later years countless more cameras were created, including the fish-eye lens. So Lomography was born and the unique images, with their over-saturated colours, crooked exposure, blurring, unpredictable processing and above all, fun, which attracted the Viennese students back in ’91, was now appealing to an ever growing audience. The creators of this movement felt it necessary to compile 10 rules to shooting with a Lomo camera. These include, to take your camera wherever you go, use it at any time, shoot from the hip and don’t think. Concluding in the one main rule, don’t follow any rules.
So how did I get on board? With a large interest and fascination with looking through a lens, be it photography or film, I wanted to start putting my passion into action and create a casual pastime for myself. Photography can be an expensive hobby to have, if you are looking for high-quality digital camera then you might be saving up for a while, so, as always, I was looking for a cheap alternative. I had been aware of Lomography for a while, having a few friends and acquaintances into photography and the distinguished and inviting look of the images had always been appealing. After researching further and the realisation that purchasing a camera wouldn’t cost me an arm and a leg I jumped in feet first. My choice of camera was the Diana Mini, a cheap and petite version of the legendary (within the Lomography world) Diana F+. The appealing things about the Diana Mini is the fact that by the flick of a switch you can split a frame in half and take two images to a frame rather than one. Which means 72 images to a roll of film rather than 36. For a more artistic direction and to add a bit fun and unpredictability it is also possible to over lap images onto one frame. My success stories with this aspect of the camera have been very pleasing (although I am constantly annoying the processing department of Boots). As this was my first experience in photography you could say that it got off to a shaky start, literally. There was a lack of success stories when I got my first roll of film developed, very shaky and sometimes obscure (even by Lomo standards!). But, on talking to some other Lomo-ers I heard that I wasn’t the only one and you learn from your mistakes. A steady hand is what you need, or even a tripod but that’s not quite Lomo style!
My style, for the most part, is almost like tourist photography, taking in my surroundings and the sights of where I am, even if that place is very familiar, like my hometown or even my house. I do believe I can do this successfully without it looking like snaps of a family holiday and I put that down to the camera itself and it’s style and capabilities. You will never become a good photographer without a decent camera that suits you and becomes a part of you. I also like to hunt out the humorous, interesting and unusual in the places I visit, like an amusing sign for sale for your house, a lone buggy or a nice image framed by a window. I like to come away from a place knowing I have tried to capture every aspect and the characteristics of it. Using the overlap technique I mentioned earlier I like to experiment with two different landscapes or buildings, the results can be unexpected, interesting and amusing. It can add another dimension to a familiar place and can captivate you and make you look at an image in far more detail. Lomography is a type of photographic art that above everything you can have fun with. It is not supposed to be taken seriously, the results can be highly rewarding and pleasing and in some cases can be equally as disappointing. You don’t know what you are going to get with a Lomo camera, you can’t even expect the unexpected. It is an exciting and unique way to photograph the world and puts the most interesting of spins on photographic art.
meet the team richard chappelow editor writer photography print design
dominic wynter print design photography
sam peat writing design
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harry tolmie-thomson writing design photography
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