Digital Portfolio

Final Presentation

Slide 1 - Introduction
- Explain what I'm going to cover in the presentation.
- Im gonna start by talking about how my process has changed or stayed the same since last year, and why certain things have changed, how what I'm working on determines the look of the work I make.
- Then I'll talk more specifically about a few projects
- I'm going to then talk about the MASSART collaboration and everything I learned from that.
- I'm going to talk about some experiences I had with print fairs and exhibiting work this year.
- I'm going to talk about Hanbury and generally about being a professional. My website, Instagram and contacting people.
- I'm going to finish with a little bit about where I think my work is lkely to sit in the industry in the future/what I want to do and what I'm planning on doing after uni.

Slide 2 to 7 - How I make work, what's changed, what hasn't
- Still prefer analogue techniques and work which looks handmade
- When I make work for myself/personal projects not much has changed since last year. I'm using a combination of collage and drawn elements and working on different types of paper, mainly in black and white.
- One big difference is that this year I'm trying to work a lot found paper so it's often unusual shapes, or I'm sticking bits to the edges etc. Which means I don't feel as hemmed in by having just one piece of paper. As I build an image the dimensions work themselves out. I didn't actually make a consciuos decision to do this but I do remember last year that Jamie said it would have been nice to see the 'no country for old men' work exist more as vignettes or without boundaries and I remember thinking "Ah that's a really good idea I wish I'd done that" so maybe it seeped into what I'm doing this year because of that. 
- I have noticed that my final major project this year doesn't really included any collage with photographs, of which there was a lot last year. This in part due to working more wanting to work more viscerally on the Son House Project. But, it's also because over summer I improved at drawing a lot and then my COP relied A LOT on drawing accurately. So I think I became more confident with drawing which meant I didn't have to rely on collage with photographs. I  actually ended up collaging more with found textures and my own drawings in place of how I was using found imagery last year.

Slide 8 to 9 - Wise Willis Poster
- I got a bit of paid work in the form of a poster for a gig my mate had to organise which was nice. I hardly ever do posters as well so it was good practice. It took me a couple of days so not too brutal and I was really happy with what I ended up. It was just based off an example the people organising the gig liked. It wasn't really that similar but had a couple of common elements.
- An example of how I still change how I work quite a lot depending on the brief so I'm still wrestling with building a cohesive body of work because I like a lot of different things that I do even though they're all different.
- Got paid £50 (will do on the 4th) which is nice.
- Problems with working with a mate: he made a fb group chat with all his friends who are creatively inclined in the beginning saying 'I need a poster does anyone want to do it?' Kind of annoying cause then were all fighting for it. Luckily some of my mates dropped out and said if those of us on creative courses could use it for our degree then we could do it. Which left two of us (me and my friend who also goes to LAU). So then we both made one and he said he'd pay us both even though only one would get used so that was cool.
- I said I'd send him one I'd made and allow for two changes. He said they wanted it with a black background cause it wasn't clear. I thought it was clear but then they were printing and also I didn't know about the callibration on the computers they were looking at it on so there were a lot of factors to be considered. I said it looks crap with a black background but here you go and sent him one anyway but I also sent loads with all different alternative colour schemes which I thought were better and they went with one I still didn't like but hey ho. I put the original on my website.

Slide 10 to 13 - MASSART
- Really Good!
- Interesting that they were way less relaxed, their course is way stricter so think they were taken aback by the fact that we can pretty much do whatever we want. It was good though their intensity was infectious,
- It was really surprising and impressive how much work everyone managed to get done in around 3 days, by all the groups. Super good fun.
- Really great working with graphic designers 'cause it meant I didn't have to worry about doing all the stuff I hate doing. It struck that's much more like what it would be like working as an illustrator.
- Collaborating is usually really annoying and difficult but this wasn't. I think that's because it was an optional sign up so everyone there wanted to be there and crack on with the work. Plus there wasn't enough time to dick around. Also they'd come all the way from America so it felt like we couldn't let them down.
- It felt super exciting.

Slide 14 - GROSS
- Katie and abbey set up a studio type thing called 'Gross' to put on events where they could showcase work and they opened it up to anyone else who wanted to get involved. The first event they put on was an exhibition at Hyde Park Book Club and it was based around the theme 'gross'. 
- Also I really hate screen printing and I ended up with loads of prints that didn't come out right. I managed to salvage the situation by cutting them down to a5 sized bits that worked individually, but they weren't particularly strong either.
- I did end up with a design though that I later printed onto t shirts and they worked really well and I plan on printing some more so that's something I can take away.
- he main take away from being part of this event was just how nice it was to work more collaboratively to set up an event which is something I don't typically do. 
-  Taking on a more curatorial role also helped me to consider my work in a slightly different way, and outside of the studio/my portfolio and I definitely came away from it feeling like it was something I'd like to be part of again.
- The exhibition was also a resounding success thanks to all the organising and promoting that preceded it (none of which I can take credit for) and there was a really exciting atmosphere which made everyone feel as though it was worth the effort. 
- I want to do the next exhibition they put on.

- Katie and Abbey organised a print fair as the second 'Gross Studio' venture at Hyde Park Book Club which gave me the opportunity to try and sell some work there. I also went and manned a table with a few other people so generally got an idea of what it's like to do print fairs.
- It feels like something that lots of illustrators do so I thought I should give it a try, but my work typically doesn't involve printed work, or even pieces of work which work as items that make sense without a context. This meant I ended up making stuff specifically for the print fair so it didn't really feel like my work, it became a little contrived.
-I do like the print but it isn't really something I could use for anything else. I also don't really like having to make a big run of prints/printing the same thing over and over again, I tend to get fed up and careless which means the prints end up being registered poorly or smudged/ dirty etc.
- I also found it difficult to price things. I think it's easy to underestimate the value of your own work. the fact that these prints were all a bit scruffy was frustrating as well because it meant I had to account for that in the price.
- Another factor that affected the price was the location of the print fair, which is a very student orientated place, meaning I couldn't really get away with charging the typical price for an A5 lino print (probably about £20-25) because students don't have any money (especially not to buy art with). as a result of these factors I ended up charging £8. Some of the prints were two colour and whilst I considered charging more for those I ended up charging the same price because the two colour ones tended to be more smudged and messy whilst a lot of the one colour ones were neater. It was easier to do one price.
- Doing the print fair did give me the incentive to try and screen print some t-shirts as well and it turned out being way more straightforward than I thought it might have been. I actually found it a lot easier than screen printing onto paper. I was really happy with the t-shirts as well and sold a couple. I would also probably try it again.
- working a print fair isn't really my bag I don't think. My work doesn't naturally sit in that realm and I find it pretty boring sitting around all day manning a table. I'm also not very good that the whole social side of it and still kind of feel a bit awkward talking about my work/ selling myself in that context. It always feels kind of weird sitting there on display whilst people walk around, I never know what to say. 
- Although that's my problem and I expect I would get over it if I did enough of them, there isn't really an incentive for me to keep pushing it seeing as its unlikely this is the direction my practice will go in. Having said that I am doing Jamie's 'Print stuff' in York with my house mates but I think that will probably be the last one for a while. I am going to print another run of the lino prints though and make a real concerted effort to be careful and neat when I'm printing them so I can charge more as 'Print stuff' is likely to attract clientele with more money and who are definitely willing to spend it on art.  

Slide 15 - Find & Seek
- Aderice organised a pop-up shop in the corn Exchange for a whole bunch of people. It was open for around four days and in a really great location so it seemed like a great opportunity to try and sell some work. 
- I took along the stuff I'd been selling previously (the lino prints and t-shirts). Helping to build the shop and set everything up was a nice collaborative venture but, although I would have thought that the Corn Exchange was a great place to sell prints, it turned out not to be suited to my work. I didn't really sell anything, and although the Corn Exchange is a popular tourist attraction, and is full of high end independent shops, I don't think my work is commercial enough for that environment.
- Hope Print Stuff is more lucrative

Slide 16 - Hanbury
- Really exciting being in London cause I've not been for years.
- A lot of the talks were helpful but some really weren't applicable to me. 
- It was nice to be able to faces to all these things that seem kind of exclusive and far away before.
- Found the publishers' and the agents the most interestng and relevant to me. 
- It was nice knowing that you could take book ideas to publishers without intending to do the writing.
- I want to make the Son House work into a book and take it to some publishers at some point so it was nice getting an idea of how the publisher/illustrator relationship worked.

- It was really nice hearing that the agents take people on with alranges of experience, even graduates sometimes.
- I think I would benefit from having an agent because I hate doing all the marketing/promotion/contacting stuff and it really colours the sides of being an illustrator that I do enjoy.
- It was nice to hear that thse agents like to talk on the phone or in person because I prefer that kind of thing.

- I do regret not talking to anyone at the Hanbury event but I couldn't shake the feeling of it being really contrived. Shallow even. It was kind of half sociable, half business and it made me feel weird. I don't think I would even feel weird about ringing someone up for advice or meeting up with someone specific to show them my portfolio/ chat etc. but for some reason the set up at Hanbury felt kind of strange. That's my problem though and something I'll just have to get over and I will the more used to it I become.

-I've emailed a lot of people who were there to mke up for the fact I didn't chat to them there.
-Sent my website etc. 

Slide 17 - After Uni
- I've applied to this course 'The Drawing Year' at the royal college of art in London which looks suuuuper good. It's a free course, you get a studio space and access to relief print facilities and they also offer a bursary. It's a year of observational drawing five days a week.
-I'm not sure I'm happy with enough with my work at the moment to start freelancing, I think this course would definitely help me get it to a much stronger point.
- It's hard to get onto though so there's a good chance I won't.
-Also it's so expensive in London and I wouldn't have time to get a job so sorting out money would be difficult. 
-Otherwise I wanna make a go of freelancing
-Send my work to agents
-Don't think I'd like to work inhouse really. 

Contacting Professionals

I made a LinkedIn account but really don't like using it. I also don't really think it's even very useful for illustrators as far as I can tell. It's not something anybody in the industry or other practitioners who have spoken at uni have ever mentioned using. Nor did anyone at Hanbury.

I've sent several emails out to people who were at the Hanbury event, as well as others who I just think are relevant to my practice and where it might sit in the future. I do find it kind of weird sending emails and tend to end up obsessing over stuff that probably doesn't matter all that much, I'm sure I'll get over it eventually. I mainly just did a sort of hello, spoke about being at Hanbury briefly if the person I emailed was there, and included a link to my website. There were a few exceptions however.


Email correspondence with a graphics student from London who was working on a collaborative brief with Amnesty international, making a poster to represent missing human rights defenders:













I never actually heard about how it all went or got any pictures back of the final poster. I've sent a follow up email recently but haven't heard anything yet so maybe it fell through.

Email sent to Sam Summerskill from B&A reps:



Email sent to Ben Cox from CIA:



Email sent to Chloe from Plum Pudding:



Email sent to Ruby Boddington from Its Nice That:



Email sent to Sam from Nobrow:


I attached some jpegs of images from a project I want to publish as a book to the email to Sam 'cause that seemed to make sense. I might be able to get some more specific feedback.


Email sent to Sophie Stericker from Hachettte:



Email to Ziggy from Cicada Books:



Attached some jpegs from my book project to this as well.


Email to Soyoung magazine:



I came sixth in a competition they run at this magazine so mentioned that in the hopes it might trigger them remembering me.


Email to The Skinny:



Email sent to Gerry Brakus of the NewStatesman:



I'd actually made some editorial illustrations for a couple of NewStatesman articles so attached those to the email I sent to Gerry. I thought this would be a really good way of showing how I would actually be responding to the work I would be commissioned by a publication such as the newstatesman and demonstrating I could do it. It also makes the email much more specifically targeted and shows I care and am not just doing this for the sake of it.


This last email chain is between me and a woman who was writing a children's book and put out an add for illustrations. I emailed about it for the hell of it and she did actually get back to me and then I quickly realised that it wasn't really suited to my work. I said I would send her some work and then just didn't so that really wasn't handled very well at all. She never chased me up about it though and I got the impression she had a fair few choices so hopefully it didn't mess her around. She never chased me up so I'm sure it didn't.

     

Creative CV

Hanbury

My thoughts on the Hanbury '57' creative discussions networking event:

It's been ages since I've been to London  and it was definitely really exciting being there and it felt very enthusing being there. I'm applying to a sort of MA type course in London next year and being there for the Hanbury event made me really excited to live there if I get on to that course. It re affirmed my suspicion that it would be a very stimulating environment creatively and I think it would definitely lead to large developments in my practice studying there.

I found the event to be a bit of a mixed bag. Most of the talks were really helpful and offered up some really great insights, but of course not all of them were relevant to me. I didn't really have anything to takeaway from Nicola St Louis (Anthropologie) for example. Also, the panel with Greg Burne (Big Active) and Ruby Boddington (It's nice that) was less useful than I might have expected it to be. It felt like Big Active is so massive, and Greg's been in the industry for so long, that  he wasn't really interested in 2D illustration anymore. That's obviously fair enough but then all the questions seemed slightly irrelevant or too focused. It made it seem a little unclear how he could advise us based on the questions that we asked him. Also, despite being a sort of agent, he seemed to only deal with big companies now doing more branding/campaign based work and that's not really related to what I do or want to do. Ruby Boddington had more relevant focused advice and the pairing of Greg and ruby did make for some interesting comparisons and variations in their answers which was interesting. It's not really fair for me to count these factors as negatives though because I'm sure all the talks were relevant to some people attending. It was just  a little frustrating not being able to pick and choose which ones I attended. The biggest takeaways from their discussion was that:

'Big Active' are very unlikely to take on illustrators.

'It's Nice That' really encourage people to reach out to them as well as being very investigative themselves.

INSTAGRAM is the biggest and most essential tool at my disposal as a creative, which is kind of sad because hate using it and find it really difficult to get into the habit of using it.

DON'T DO ANYTHING THAT'S BEEN DONE BEFORE

BE PROACTIVE, HOUND PEOPLE

Show your process as part of your output, people will buy into the whole package/brand of you.
 



Biggest takeaways from the Publishing panel discussion (Nobrow, Cicada and Hachette):

Bring a draft and 2/3 finished spreads to publishers to initiate a back and forth discussion.

OR

Publishers will find illustrators they like, or, they have an idea and select appropriate illustrator

They may approach agencies.

ALWAYS SEND IDEAS THROUGH.

'Cicada' look at everything they get sent because they're very small and they usually get back to you.

IT'S A NUMBERS GAME.

GOT TO ALWAYS BE PUTTING STUFF OUT THERE.

'Nobrow' have open submissions but they don't get back to you. That doesn't mean they didn't look at what you sent though.

ORIGINALITY

SUBMIT TO COMPETITIONS. Publishers look at them.

TARGET PEOPLE, BE PERSONAL

Children's books are more popular.

'Nobrow' don't do concertina books anymore.

Saddle stitch books are not visible on the shelf so don't sell very well.

Send something physical and follow up with an email. Although Ruby Boddington said that all that matters to her really is the work, so just sending an email is fine.

Don't something physical to mall publishers because their tastes might be too specific.

Can't easily send physical items internationally.

Trust the changes a publisher wants to make to your work, don't be too stubborn. Be easy to work with.

Be flexible and good at communicating.

You don't have to be able to write.


Biggest takeaways from CIA and B&A Reps:

B&A want people early on.

ORIGINALITY

Try and get stuff in magazines.

Larger agencies give you a better shot at getting work.

Editorial work is like paid marketing.

Real life meetings are the best, then phone calls, then emails but emails are the most convenient.

The talk from the agencies as a whole was really encouraging. I was surprised to learn that they take people on straight away after graduating and don't care about experience if they like the work. They also seemed like they took a really vested interest in the artists they represent and would kind of mentor a bit. I think I would definitely benefit from having an agent because at the moment it's all the business side of being an illustrator that I can't stand doing and sadly it is really starting to colour even the creative side for me and I can definitely see it interfering with my drive to make it work in the future.

I do regret not talking to anyone at the Hanbury event but I couldn't shake the feeling of it being really contrived. Shallow even. It was kind of half sociable, half business and it made me feel weird. I don't think I would even feel weird about ringing someone up for advice or meeting up with someone specific to show them my portfolio/ chat etc. but for some reason the set up at Hanbury felt kind of strange. That's my problem though and something I'll just have to get over and I will the more used to it I become.

I do intend to email a lot of the people who attended Hanbury personally with a link to my website and any specific questions I have for them, and just generally trying to make some contacts. It feels like a good place to start.














 

Website

I built a website on Squarespace after having a bit of a look around at all the options (Cargo collective, wix etc.) and deciding it was one I found easiest to use. It was also the cheapest because they offer the first year at half price if you sign up with a students email, which works out at £5 a month. The only downside is you have to pay for the year at once (£60) and they sneakily avoid telling you that until the end. I've been waiting until I have the scratch to pay for for it but you only get to keep a website draft for about 10 days without paying before it gets deleted. This means I've had to build the same website three times. I should hopefully be making it live soon and I bought the domain 'alexbrownillustration.com' (also from Squarespace) so I'm good to go. This post has some screen shots of the draft but it will look the same.

I opted for a very straightforward design which should be very easy to navigate. It has the title (Alex Brown illustration) on the side and right below a list of categories of my work (No Country For Old Men, The Uncanny, Posters, Portraiture and Photography). There is no specific home page, its just set as one of my galleries, at the moment its all the work I made based around 'No Country For Old Men' but I might change it as I keep uploading content and changing stuff around in the future. When you click on an image it appears larger and you can click through them in that viewing mode one at a time. 

I included a hyperlink to my Bandcamp page where I upload music to create connections between all my creative output. When I emailed Molly Fairhurst for PP last year she said it was a good idea to use social media to just show your general interests because clients get an idea of what you're like and the kinds of work you'd be suitable for or interested in as a result. This isn't exactly like that but I think it uses a similar principle and it all helps form more of a holistic creative identity. 

There is also a hyperlink to my Instagram. 

I originally had a 'contact' page which would show my email when you clicked on it but I found a way of adding it as a tag line beneath the title so it's always visible and I think that's better. Lou Bones also mentioned in her talk that it was important to have your contact details visible immediately.  

UPDATE: My Website is now live - https://www.alexbrownillustration.com/ 

'Find and Seek' pop-up shop

Aderice organised a pop-up shop in the corn Exchange for a whole bunch of people. It was open for around four days and in a really great location so it seemed like a great opportunity to try and sell some work. I took along the stuff I'd been selling previously (the lino prints and t-shirts). Helping to build the shop and set everything up was a nice collaborative venture but, although I would have thought that the Corn Exchange was a great place to sell prints, it turned out not to be suited to my work. I didn't really sell anything, and although the Corn Exchange is a popular tourist attraction, and is full of high end independent shops, I don't think my work is commercial enough for that environment. I thought it might be similar to Jamie's 'print stuff' but actually now I'm hoping that 'Print stuff' will be a lot more of an appropriate audience and more lucrative as a result.