For this blog post, I will be writing about my first time attending Nicer Tuesdays and my thoughts on the speakers and also shining a light on the speakers that spoke. They hold this event at the end of every month on the last Tuesday of the month hosted at Oval Space in East London. It’s great that these events are not only design base but also hearing each speaker with different delightful works from alternative backgrounds but still showing flair and creativity.
30 APRIL 2019 | LONDON
Nicer Tuesdays
The four speakers on the night talking through their creative process were illustrator and painter Alice Tye, art director and creative consultant Ben Ditto, Photographer Yushi Li and one of the creative directors from the Swiss design studio, Dinamo.
So if you haven’t check out the website for future events: https://www.itsnicethat.com/nicer-tuesdays
Alice Tye – Illustrative Painter
Her work is excellent with great use of layers within the paintings. I think painting your holiday travels is a great idea. I used to do watercolours when I was younger and would love to get started again. Unfortunately, life gets in the way. The next time I go on holiday, I will make sure to paint a picture no matter how abstract. It is fabulous that Alice paints these paintings to capture her travels. Alice has worked for many companies and publications such as Moët Hennessy, The Guardian, and The Washington Examiner. I think the beauty of Alices work is that its very original and it has an illustrative aspect to her work.
I think the great thing about Nicer Tuesdays is that it’s not all about design but championing all creativity in general.
To see more of Alice Tye’s work list her website on: https://www.alicetye.com
Ben Ditto – On art directing Dazed Beauty
Ben is an art director and creative consultant. He art directed publishing house Dazed Media’s new digital and print platform, Dazed Beauty. Working in the art and design industry for ten years, and the project for Dazed Media came about when he got introduced to editorial director Bunny Kinney by makeup artist Isamaya French.
He started the talk off by showing off the logo he created. Ben described the logo as being an alien art nouveau style logo that you’ve never seen before. But within the chrome reflections of the logo is this sci-fi makeup world. The lipstick has crashed landed into the sand, and the user has left to explore this world. The work isn’t totally to my liking, but I do think that Ben has reflected the brand’s identity and captured Dazed beauty. The fashion industry is a strange, crazy world. But the work is edgy and relatively alternative. The use of technology Ben has used is admirable and what you can use it for with the use of CGI, AR, and AI and also creating Snapchat filters.
Yushi Li – Photographing men she met through Tinder
Yushi Li is currently doing her Phd in Arts and Humanities at Royal College of Art. She’s a self described Chinese woman that likes Sushi but she’s not Japanese. She was immediately interesting and quirky. For her Phd she explores beauty of naked men she meets on Tinder. She says we are full of a world that glories the naked body of a women but why not a man.
I can imagine a fair amount of people thinking this is strange but also dangerous because she will be putting trust into that man within her home and while she takes photos of them naked. I feel Yushi gets a sense of power from taking pictures of these men, and she explains that she likes to be the dominant one and explore the vulnerability of the men she photographs.
I think its different and hasn’t been explored before. I think its brave of the men to take their kit off for some photographs as its very personal. I was thinking to myself would I do something like this and I think I would. The photos are not perverted or sexual, so why not. I suppose it is just capturing the beauty of the human form.
Fabian Hard – Dinamo
The final speaker of the night was Fabian Hand; he is one half Swiss design duo Dinamo. He started the talk by acknowledging the people who work closely with Dinamo, and he stresses the importance of acknowledgment. I also think this is as an essential point that you should recognize your work colleagues or the people involved in projects or the people who make your agency excellent.
Fabian went through his process on the development of his typefaces. I think it is beautiful that he went to type specimens library to inspire his type designs. From that, Fabian was then able to dissect the type found and then digitalised it to understand it better. I think the highlight of the talk was when he showed the variable font through the use of code. I do believe this is the future of type design. Rather than being restrictive by the font, you can then have a variable font and have whatever weight you require for your project. However, I do believe we are in a world full of choice and maybe have too many options for stunning our creative capacity.
When I went to Hacking Glutenburg at St Brides Library hearing letterpress expert Eric Spieckerman talk, he mentions that because you only have a specific font size based on the metal/wood letter sets that you have in your collection. With this, he says that it forces you to be creative with what you have rather than having something that at your fingertips and can have whatever size you want its restricts and forces you to create something unique and different. I’m not saying that with a variable you’re not going to be creative with how you use it because I still think you can, but I feel with the less you have to work with the more it will push your creativity.