Storm and Rene. ITAP

Here I would break the rules and write less. Because it is less I have to say. Artists would talk for himselves. Storm Thorgerson. One of my favourite artists, without a doubt. Artist, photographer, designer – he is known for working in all  branches of art. His fantasy, point of view, technique – I love everything he does. He designed CD covers for hundreds of very well known artists from Peter Gabriel (Peter Gabriel 1) and Pink Floyd (Back Catalogue, the Wall) to Muse (Absolution) and Audioslave (Audioslave), collaborated with world-class artists, created number of books, logos, illustrations, posters, designs.. Countless pieces of work, real and surreal at the same time. I am not going to talk about him much – his works talk for him. Necessary to cast a glance at his works here.

Anyway, there is a question – how does he stay so creative? Where all his ideas came from? The past I would say. And RenĂ© Magritte, of course. Storm thorgerson is a great example of getting inspiration from other artists, but not reproducing their ideas, just  making those ideas his ideas, represent them in differend way, watching from a differend angle. It is obvious that we can not compare techniques of these artists, Thorgerson – digital artist the most and magritte – classic painter, but point of view, seeing of the world and ideas – that‘s what unite them. Magritte teaches how to make the audience think, he is thought-provoking specialist, teacer of Storm Thorgerson and a number of other artists. You can visit his museum in Belgium.

Some work of both artists

 

Some inspirations. ITAP



Managing creative environment


Japanese artist’s Kyoichi Tsuzuki’s home and office in Tokyo. Tsuzuki is an artist, journalist, editor, art curator, nightclub designer, book publisher and latterly, photographer, he has made it his life’s mission to reveal and define creativity as it manifests itself outside ‘high’ or mainstream culture (The Photographers' Gallery, http://www.photonet.org.uk/index.php?pxid=129). 




Abigail Ahern is now heralded as  one of the hottest designers in the UK. She works with the interiors, furniture and decotation, brand development. She is known for glamorous and multilayered, colourful style (http://www.atelierabigailahern.com/).



Artist‘s studios and the whole environment is creative, if they feel the lack of ideas they cam grab anything they need from the shelf and start generating ideas. The environment is also very personal, collection of books, journals, toys, decorations, stationery, paintings, artwork, computers – everyting we can see is useful, everything seems to have place in almost overloaded interiors. Memories, new stuff, information, they just have to grab it if they need any of these, but every single thing is important, nothing is there wothout a purpose. Collection of books also help to generate new ideas, to rest from old work, to charge yoursef. It gives more cosiness to the room, more intimacy and artistic mess. Maybe for other people half of the stuff could seem to be totally unuseful rubbish, but in the artist‘s hands it becomes more than this, it becomes start point of ideas, of job, it becomes inspiration and grows into something huge, something that you can not be apathetic.

For a little peek into artist‘s working places and inspiration: http://www.theselby.com



Restating problems

 




Horacio Salinas – amazing artist, a conceptual still life photographer, currently based in New York. His work is stunning, surprising, full of research and is very gamesome. The artist looks at things in an unconventional way, he creates the whole story from the most simple things, solves problems in most unbelievable ways and his works can have so many meanings,  for example the Feather spray can. For ones it can seem as a graffiti art promotion, for others it can tell the story about harmless paint, about the love between spray and the wall, story about flying.. His work is designed for the visually-thinking man, for a smart, intellectual viewer, who could understand a metaphor and irony in his works. Every single peace is inspiring, it makes you think of how has he actually came to this conception, how has he stated and restated the problem? It looks amazingly simple, but at the same time you understand that it might take ages to create such a picture. The works are extremely technical, inspirational and contemporary. Composition, lightning, placing  of things, every single object has it‘s place, form and meaning. Works are not overcrowded, we can say they are minimalistic. Unpretentious background of the picture lets the viewer concentrate on the main object, which is carefully chosen and integrated into the whole concept. His work is not just to be admired yet to be challenged. It makes you think, makes you want to create something your own, something simple, but stunning.

Sketch. Think. ITAP

 
Principle 2. Brain
This is one of the pictures from the project called ‘If Drawings Were Photographs’ by Tom Edwards and Rob Matthew. First of all artists made sketches, drawings and then tried to convert it into a photograph. It is a playful piece of work, which made artists create, think and play with the ideas and generation, search for a fun and interesting way of turning it into image. How can this painting turn into image? What materials, colors, techniques to use? Those were the main questions for the artists. The audience artists are referring to might be optimistic people with a sense of humor, people who could understand that this work is done including game as well as analysis. And the final piece makes the audience smile, feel playful and ask questions as well. It stimulates imagination, creativity, allows us feel like a child again, makes us think of how they have found the decision of the problem. The dog in the picture is ironically humanized by using glasses, the background is simple, we can see the walls of the apartment, the simplicity of camera parameters, poor flash, lightning, bad focus, everything is simple, ordinary things, including composition and atmosphere, it also shows that the artists were not developing extraordinary ideas, they just tells us that even with the most simple things you can create something more than a dull everyday photography. Some people might not like this picture and the whole project for low quality and parameters, but the most important in this is the idea itself, the simplicity and minimalism in both, illustration and photograph. It captures attention, surprises, makes us think, frown or smile and all in all you can really love it or hate it.




Principle 5. Reflection
This is a fragment from Eugene Delacroix‘s (1798-1863) sketchbook. At the time, at about 1830’s famous French painter was travelling in northern Africa with the diplomatic mission, just after French invasion to Aleria. Artist wanted to escape from civilisation, know different, primitive people and culture. He was drawing everything he saw around him, as we can see in the picture: people, faces, landscapes, shapes, moments of life, warriors, diplomats and also he combined drawings with text, brief notes of memories, explanations, ideas. Text and drawing combined together complete artist’s thoughts, it relflects each other and helps to remember original ideas better than text or drawing sepparately. Artist was not searching for the perfect composition and details by sketching, though the colouring and drawing are realistic, the artist tried to record everything that surrounded him, create and remember some simple ideas for the future generation. First of all these sketches were designed for himself only, for discovering, developing new concepts, thoughts for paintings, it was recording of travelling and exploration of new, differend, unknown wild world, but on the other hand, nowadays we can analyse it from historical point of view as well, as his notes and sketches gives us a lot of information about the incidents, life and war in nothern Africa.

Taken from:  Artists's sketchbooks