4.28.2006

Toffe

Toffe_3.jpg
Toffe_2.jpg
Toffe_1.jpg
Featured in Eye 58: Ugly-beautiful by Adrian Shaughnessy
Design: Christophe Jacquet aka Toffe
Again another ornamental theme, but the intricacy and craziness of Toffe's work really appealed to me. It was hard to see just how interesting the vector drawings he did were so I thought a close up of the overall style would show what I liked most about this French man. It's the randomness of the tight curls and lines that I thought really stood out.

4.26.2006

Alvin Lustig

LUST_14.jpgLUST_13.jpg
LUST_10.jpgLUST_09.jpg
LUST_01.jpgLUST_02.jpg
LUST_05.jpg LUST_04.jpg
LUST_12.jpgLUST_15.jpg
Featured in Eye 59: Digital history book by Rick Poynor
Design: Alvin Lustig
Mr Poynor writes: 'increasingly it seems that if something can’t be found with Google, then it doesn’t exist.'
I'm sure that's very true. Luckily Kind Company put together a brilliant Lustig website (click the title of this entry to view it). It's excellent because it's a veritable database of amazing work. The site is easy to use and navigate through which is refreshing in such a flash driven, user experience, interactive era. I think Lustig's work is superb and the ability to look through such an enormous body of work brilliant. It was my favourite piece in the issue. I'm just sorry it couldn't show all the work. Above are my favourite things. I think they are very striking and I love the design work for the Girl Scouts. He did a great deal of stuff for them, which just seems bizarrely designed when you think of the subject matter. I quite like that. More on Flickr

4.25.2006

Guy Bourdin









One of the most important fashion photographers of the 20th century.
His work for French Vogue and Ad campaigns for Charles Jourdan are probably his most celebrated.
I really like the narratives in his pictures, I think his mixture of glamour and sexual suspense are key elements which make his images so memorable.

4.21.2006

Marian Bantjes





Featured in Eye 58: The decriminalisation of ornament. Spurned and marginalised for a century, decoration is enjoying a guilt-free renaissance. By Alice Twemlow
Design: Marian Bantjes

Out of everything I saw in the Eye 58 issue, the work of Marian Bantjes was the most striking. The attention to detail and the contemporary view of ornament appealed to me greatly.

Observations



Book:Observations, Photographs by Richard Avedon Comments by Truman Capote
Design: Alexey Brodovitch
Date:1959

This spread is from one of the most interesting photography books I have ever seen.
Almost the entire book has this simplistic and incredibly elegant look. I especially like this spread. I think the contrast and positioning of the two images make it a very dramatic and beautiful composition. The John Huston image is much bigger, and incredibly expressive. The Hitchckock image is much smaller and almost motionless.
In my view this very simple example of contrast has far reaching implications that apply not only to photography but to all other forms of art and design.