A graduating Camberwell College of the Arts Student, this week’s Talent displays a good visual eye through stunning photographs and stylish, stripped-back typographic work.
How would you describe your practice?
I’m not sure if I’ve figured out what it is just yet, as it might take a bit of time to understand what I’ve actually been doing for the past year. But in my most recent work I’ve explored the idea of letting the content speak for itself. I’m interested in finding a certain characteristic within the work that you can then use as a system within which to operate. I enjoy the idea of deciding on a rule and letting that rule dictate the outcome. This process does require a decent level of understanding of the material in order to create a competent and respectful response, which is why using design as a means to educate myself is something that I hope to continue.
You studied graphic design at Camberwell, what's the course like there and what have you taken from it?
What I've enjoyed most about the course is the complete freedom you have to approach a subject. There is no direction you can’t take a project: we were encouraged to take the most appropriate course of action in regards to our own investigations, not the course’s ideals or – more importantly – each others. The emphasis on process is something that is made clear from day one. Knowing the reasons why we would do some things and why not others, is infinitely more valuable than just being capable of creating well finished outcomes.
I would say that the course does require a large amount of self motivation – there isn’t going to be anything handed to you – but saying that, the technicians, tutors and staff that are available have been one of the consistent highlights throughout the three years.
You did a project with Fraser Muggeridge that involved setting a record for the world's largest enlarged letter – could you tell us a bit about how that came about?
The World’s Largest Enlarged Letter is a project that was first initiated by Fraser during a series of workshops hosted by Camberwell Press entitled Into The Fold. During these he, and eleven other participants, selected a letterform from various type specimens and proceeded to enlarge it by 200 per cent on a photocopier. The resulting pages were then tiled together with the A4 photocopies. The first attempt had been set at 12,288pt. Fraser had expressed the fact that he wanted someone to beat the record and with that in mind, my fellow classmate George Wood and I went on to create a 30,720pt letter, unbeknown to Fraser. Alongside making the letter itself, we also produced a supporting publication and a short film documenting the process.
We stared with a letter ‘K’ from a typeface called Flaxman, which only exists in Camberwell’s letterpress studio. Chosen for its relatively equal amount of white space to the body of the letter, in an attempt to save ourselves photocopying too many blank pages. We used around 4000 sheets of A4 to get to the final size – which was something like 10 hours of photocopying.
We were originally only aiming to get to 20,000pt, but luckily realised that the record was broken by two students from the University of the West of England just when we had started our attempt, so we had to go a little bigger. If anybody wants to try and get to 60,000pt, you’re going to need a lot of paper.
Is it true you had one of your photographs in Country Living USA? If so, how did that come about?
It is absolutely true. It was a photograph I had taken whilst on holiday of a puppy that was refusing to cross the street. I put it up on Flickr (this was around three years ago) and I got a message from a guy who worked in the New York offices asking if they could use it for their magazine. I of course said yes.
What are you working on now and what's next?
I’ve got a couple of things planned which are a continuation of my final project and for which I only had the ideas for afterwards. In terms of what’s next, Camberwell Press offer recent graduates from within the university internships in design and editorial roles as well as also being able to use the college’s workshops. So after seeing the south coast again for a few months, I’ll hopefully be back at Camberwell.
stephen-dalley.co.uk
