Utilising design for the common good

I am privileged with having the freedom to decide and dictate the path my graphic design business takes and as a person unapologetically of the left leaning persuasion, Lennon Design has always reflected my values.

Over the years my personal mission has been to work closely with the third sector, arming the many charities and voluntary organisations with professional communication tools to help raise their profile, get their messages out to their communities and assist them to compete for the scarce but essential funding they require for survival in this austerity age.

Well I’m looking at the calendar and I can’t believe it’s April already. Why the radio silence, what became of the more regular chatty blogs? Well folks, quite simply I’ve been doing a bit of life restructuring and dream following, both at the same time - who says we can’t multi-task.

I’m writing this and wondering how to avoid sounding like a well-meaning but hectoring life coach. The answer is I’m not sure I can but what I’ll do is simply offer you my approach rather than a few glib one size fits all mantras and promise to keep adjusting the tone if I start to stray. Deal?

A humorous look at the high cost of meddling

Recently I decided to take my own good advice and think about refreshing my sadly out-of-date and neglected art website which I use to promote my alter ego Lennon Art. Pay attention to the word ego here because I’ll come back to it.

Artist’s websites are notorious for being awful at best. There are of course millions of bad sites on the web in every sector, but artists really seemed to have taken this to a whole new level. Search around and you’ll find some wonderful examples of incomprehensible crazy concepts, a lack of regard for appropriate typography, an ignorance of accessibility and usability issues and all nicely underpinned by an overall embarrassing amateurism. Sorry if that sounds too harsh. There are of course many exceptions out there but I wouldn’t be able to make my point clearly if I was being rational and fair and not chance a little rant for literary effect!

A recent chance comment by a former design student I mentor, inspired this piece. I was showing him a new book I’d just collected, ‘Photomontage between the Wars’, not exactly a gripping holiday read for many I’m sure, but I love it. He flicked through these amazing, cut and paste images and said “Wow, Imagine what they could do with our tools now!” And that’s what got me thinking...

Photomontage what is it?

Our online oracle, Wikipidea, defines it as: ‘The process and the result of making a composite photograph by cutting, gluing, rearranging and overlapping two or more photographs into a new image.’ You cannot be serious! (well it’s Wimbledon), our kids do something similar at Nursery. What’s the big deal and when did it become a serious art form?

iTrauma and the Confessions of a Justified Sinner

What you are about to read are the rambling thoughts of someone who has reluctantly accepted that maintaining the status quo is no longer an option in this multi media madness of the modern world. Yes readers I reached for the mirror and found to my horror a 'conservative' staring back. Thankfully it was the type 2, small 'c' reactionary type which responds to treatment.

‘So I turned myself to face me...’

For too long I had clung to my safe but relatively static comfort zone, but as we all know, although the zone can feel a nice place, nothing grows there! What am I rambling about... iTrauma - the painfull but necessary process of digital evolution and keeping up with the times. So how did this start?

Why has a 100 year old graphic style from the heart of revolutionary Russia become one of the most globally recognised and enduring art movements ever?

What are we talking about?

Constructivism that’s what. This was an artistic and architectural movement in Russia from 1914 onward which dismissed "pure" or fine art in favour of art used as an instrument for social and political purposes. The term 'Construction Art' was initially a mocking term coined by Kazimir Malevich, pioneer of the earlier Suprematist style. Malevich aimed to create expression and feeling in his work solely through the ‘symphonic arrangement of shapes on a field of white.' Malevich also worked in the constructivist style. Other big players were Alexander Rodchenko, known for his strong graphic approach, sculptor Vladimir Tatlin and El Lissitzky who is credited with bringing a unity between painting and architecture.