Surprising Visits

The visits to the V&A Museum's 'Cold War' exhibition and the Design Museum's 'The Man with Kaleidoscope Eyes' exhibition, were both surprisingly inspiring. Personally I liked the Alan Aldridge exhibition more.

The Cold War exhibition was really well organized, and I have to say, it was massive! I was very interested in seeing the product design style they used, but most of all I was very interested in graphic design from that era. My favorite thing were the posters, they were clean, direct, and the use of typography and color was very eye catching (and all done by hand!). It's amazing to see these things and try to imagine what was happening in that particular moment in time. I think the designers and artists were living in a new era, a time where creation and innovation were valued differently. These were the bases for our current designs, and I find that it is very important to really appreciate this, and their creations at the time. It was a very impressive and eye-opening experience.

I loved the Alan Aldridge exhibition, although I don't necessarily love ALL of his work, I found it completely different and actually quite inspiring. I really liked the way the exhibition was built, and the way they presented his sketches as well as his finished designs. I found most of his illustrations very interesting; the simpler ones, were actually the ones I liked the most. These illustrations were a reminder to me as a designer, that I shouldn't be afraid to use big blocks of bold color, and that sometimeswe complicate ourselves so much, and try to fit in our designs lots of elements, we deviate from our objective: delivering a clear message. 

Alan Aldridge is a very inspiring artist, and simply a very original and innovative person, what I think all designers should be. The fact that so many influential and famous artists/singer/performers wanted him to be a part of his projects, shows how distinct and well produced his work was. I think, like the artists in the Cold War exhibition, Alan Aldridge, helped define an artistic era, where a new culture was born; and he was a very big part of this, presenting himself through one of the most important aspects in that moment: music (and many others of course!). Lots of his work, not only inspired me and gave me a different perspective on how to approach my RSA project, but also in my idea for my collection project.

Also, it inspired me as a designer, to not be afraid to take risks, and do things differently, because, I think this is when you find yourself out of your comfort zone, and creating different, innovative and great designs!