AGIdeas

"AGIdeas is the largest annual International Design Event held in Australia. AGIdeas presents a series of events for designers who are seeking inspiration, for designers emerging in the industry to explore the possibilities of international careers in design and for companies looking to embrace design as an economic driver".

Well that's what the website had to say.

I turned up and stayed for the whole three days except for Tuesday evening.
It was a fantastic forum and it's hard to come back to the real world.

It's late Thursday night and I'm trying to remember the best bits of the three days.
Ken Cato opened each day (graphic designer).







Short intro, and into the business of presentations.

A presentation every 30 minutes, (some shorter others longer.
Ideas, images, sounds, I tried to take some photos ignoring the instructions not to use cameras and lashes (Flashes) but I was spotted and told. I did get a couple of blurry images and will upload them in time.

Highlights/presenters

Day 1

Christoph Niemann
"Christoph Niemann was born in Waiblingen, Germany in 1970. After his studies at the Stuttgart Academy of Fine Arts, he moved to New York City where he has been working as an illustrator, animator, and graphic designer since 1997."

Great opening presentation.
His ideas and polished presentation style covered a wide range of topics, from working with publishers, dealing with the Illustration brief and needing one to work from, having personal projects and writing/illustrating for children.


Mark Seymour
Acclaimed singer/songwriter Mark Seymour’s music and lyrics have formed an indelible part of Australia’s musical landscape. He has followed his eighteen years with Hunters & Collectors with a vibrant solo recording career.

Maybe it''s just me, but the metaphor used by Mark to describe the search for that something that keeps you going as an artist really hit home.
The metaphor was a carrot dangling in front of you and you just keep your eyes on that carrot and try as hard as you can to get to taste it, but fail.
I suspect he got to taste it at some point in his career , but was not going to admit that.
He talked about fame, record companies, video clips and finished with a song. (applause from the crowd).

Day 2

Sara Fanelli was born in Florence and went to London to study art and has been working there as a freelance illustrator ever since graduating from the Royal College of Art.

Wow! if I ever get my hands on one of her books I will never let it out of my sight. 40 books were available and I never got to touch one of them. I'll have to get to readings over the weekend to see if they have it. Her nostalgic, eclectic style and references to literature, poetry, design, typography made her books look like precious objects. No images could do justice to these books but here is one.

Richard Seymour is one of Europe’s best-known product designers. Trained as a graphic designer and illustrator initially, his career has taken him from book to record-sleeve design, through advertising and film production design to a commanding position on the International stage, with Seymourpowell (which he created with Dick Powell in 1984), now regarded as
one of the world’s leading Product Design Consultancies. The consultancy has won numerous design awards for its work over the last 20 years, including D&AD Silver Awards, The D&AD President’s Award for Outstanding Contribution to Design, DBA Design Effectiveness Awards, and even two nominations for the Prince Phillip Design Prize.

Richard is a trustee of the Design Museum in London, Past President of D&AD, Consultant Deign Director to Lever Faberge in London and New York.

Richard Seymour talked about his failed projects because he said that he learned his lessons from things which failed.

One of his projects was to build a shelter which was cheap to build and could be thrown out of a plane to any location around the globe. The shelter would open like a parachute and land safely providing an opportunity for a whole family to take cover.
A number of such shelters were dispatched in a disaster zone in Africa. The locals came, tore down the shelters and used the material to re-build their old houses.

He also talked about the power of the technology and how it could be used by individuals.
10 years ago he worked on a small project with a 12 year old boy, they made a small movie about homeless people in London. The movie was sent as an attachment to an email to friends of the 12 year old. After a period of about six months the movie ended up on the desktop of the British prime minister. Richard was called to explain his involvement in the project.

He compared this time to that of the renaissance, he felt that we are sitting in the eye of the storm.