THIS BLOG IS NOW ARCHIVED 

Please refer to your college info for the new web address or email Laura.Deane@asfc.ac.uk

Pride is 50 !

THIS BLOG IS NOW ARCHIVED  

The RoyalMail has launched new postage stamps to celebrate the 50th Anniversary of Pride;

The designs are based around the idea of ‘a march through time’, and were brought to life by animation studio Animade. NB Studio commissioned Birkin thanks to her “joyous and colourful style of illustration” – which seemed the perfect fit for the milestone celebration for the LGBTQ+ community.

https://www.creativereview.co.uk/nbstudio-royal-mail-pride-stamps/

Dear 2021...

 It seems (according to Spotify, Facebook and other platforms ) that its time to look back on the year . I came across this beautiful project where 2 friends exchanged weekly postcards across the Atlantic which visualised their weeks in data. 

http://www.dear-data.com/theproject 

"Each week, and for a year, we collected and measured a particular type of data about our lives, used this data to make a drawing on a postcard-sized sheet of paper, and then dropped the postcard in an English “postbox” (Stefanie) or an American “mailbox” (Giorgia)!

Eventually, the postcard arrived at the other person’s address with all the scuff marks of its journey over the ocean: a type of “slow data” transmission."

Poster Masterclass

One of the most brilliant designers in the UK's history was Tom Eckersley who worked mainly in public information illustration (that's posters that tell you stuff - to you & me!)  A new book has been published to celebrate the work of Eckersley "The graphic designer and poster artist was one of the key contributors to the explosion of visual print culture in Britain during the 20th century." 

Along with designers such as Abram Games , Eckersley was a master of the art of minimalism and gestalt; as the poster for the London Underground below shows. The Visual metaphor of the scissors immediately says shortening / cutting to us. See more of his work here : TOM ECKERSLEY

 

You Made It !

We are almost at the end of another year - huge congratulations to the leavers in the A2 year for their patience and resilience - as well as their fantastic work. You can see the work on our Flickr exhibition here https://www.flickr.com/photos/asfcartdepartment/albums/72157719399051731

A'level Results come out this year on August 10th and we look forward to hearing about your celebrations and progressions to pastures new ! 

We took advantage of the gorgeous sunshine yesterday & took our class photos A level Graphic Design Class of '21 (The Covid Year!) As the A2 students enter their final stages of the course, we wish them every luck (not that they will need it as they are a talented bunch). 

 

So what do you know ?

Fed up doomscrolling ? Try taking the Design week Quiz to see how much you know about 2020 and design ? 

https://www.designweek.co.uk/take-design-weeks-quiz-of-the-year-2020/ 

Art foundation remembrance event 2020

 

Art at Ashton Sixth Form College

ART at ASHTON SIXTH FORM COLLEGE

Watch our latest video here : 

https://youtu.be/E0sJ2u26iic

 A great article on the proposed branding for 2028 LA Olympics : 

https://www.designweek.co.uk/issues/31-august-6-september-2020/2028-la-olympics-logo/

Check out this post from talented designer De2S who has re-imagined famous logos to refresh & update. 

https://www.demilked.com/famous-logo-redesigns-de2s/

Think you know your Banksy from your Braques ? Can you tell a Picasso from a Paolozzi ? 

Test your art knowledge with these quizzes & short articles : 

5 art styles you may not know  

https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2020/aug/20/great-british-art-quiz-the-final

https://www.beano.com/posts/the-ultimate-art-quiz

40 years of design culture...

2020 has undoubtedly been the most memorable year in a long while ...and as a design student its crucial to know about design history , culture & society - but where to start ? 

Creative Review have pulled together the most important (in its view..) of the last 40 years including MTV, the "like a girl" campaign and Fleabag. See what you would have added in or left out . Twin Peaks would be out for me - several hours of my life I won't get back. And if you haven't seen Fleabag, do. 

https://www.creativereview.co.uk/40-creative-moments-that-changed-culture/

Now you see it..

Now you see it, now you ...well, see something different. Who is this an image of ? Think you know then check the link below to see if you're right !



https://www.grapheine.com/en/graphic-design-en/art-science-of-hybrid-images

Be a hero. Be Boring.

https://www.creativebloq.com/news/dull-superheroes

Noma Bar is king of the optical illusion, and he's recently used his talents to create a series of optical illusion posters encouraging people to be 'boring heroes', and stay indoors. The posters were created in collaboration with McCann New York, McCann Health New York and medicine company Mucinex. 

The series shows people in their homes lounging around, reading books, listening to music and using their phones, and these images are all cleverly combined with images of more traditional superheroes.

Art is the best medicine (official)

Any of you who saw Grayson Perry's Art club last night on Channel 4 can't have failed to see the joy that people have in creating art - from the embroidered duster to the portrait plate drawn by Grayson of his wife Phillipa Perry. 

The link below is from an exhibition last year where famous comedians exhibited their work ,Joe Lycett comments 

“Comedians have that spirit of ‘give it a go’ - do a new material night, try it out and see what happens,” says Lycett. “We're maybe more used to failing in front of lots of people. Failure is kept in the dark for a lot of other creatives - who only put out their best stuff, whereas comedians have to try and fail all the time, in order to see what works.”

https://inews.co.uk/culture/arts/art-is-the-best-medicine-fiumano-clase-harry-hill-interview-josie-long-comedians-exhibition-1326301

Jim Moir's Batman (Vic Reeves) 

Picmonkey

If you are missing Photoshop , try PicMonkey - which works well on phones as well as PCs etc. It uses a lot of the same features as Photoshop such as layers, dodge, burn etc. Worth a go.

https://www.picmonkey.com/home/signup

It's WORLD BOOK DAY !

Book covers are amazing pieces of design - they have to communicate the story (without giving away too much), hold a title, the author, the publisher ...it's a lot to communicate in a small space.
Have a look at this clip where a book designer explains how he works through the process.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/bitesize/clips/ztv6yrd

Then maybe have a look at this :

https://www.penguin.co.uk/company/work-with-us/student-design-award/student-design-award.html


which features award winner Lucie Williams who studied A'level Graphic design at ASFC a few years ago. (we're very proud !)

Finally, watch this where the presenter takes an image right through to Book cover design
https://www.bbc.co.uk/bitesize/clips/zxfmsbk

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Creativity is NOT cancelled !

Hey this is nice ! 

Welcome to the ‘Art is where the home is’ activity pack! On the following pages lots of artists have designed lots of fun activities for you to make and do at home. You can choose to do one or two of them, or all of them. You can do them on your own or with other people, morning, noon or night. We are adding more artists’ designs every week. To find out when these are being shared, sign up to the Firstsite mailing list on our website www.firstsite.uk/newsletter When you have made your artworks, we’d love to see them. Share your creations by posting on your chosen social media channels, and don’t forget to tag us! Facebook @firstsite Twitter @firstsite Instagram @firstsitecolchester

Artists such as Jeremy Deller  Ryan Gander  Antony Gormley Idris Khan Michael Landy  Annie Morris  Harold Offeh   susan pui san lok    Bob and Roberta Smith  Mark Titchner   Mark Wallinger  &  Gillian Wearing have contributed. 

ARTISTS PACK LINK HERE