Last May when I was in New York for BlogtourNYC I visited an exhibition as part of WantedDesign 2015 called Inside Out. Polish Graphic Design and Illustration in the Making, an exhibition organized by Culture.pl. It featured some of the best of Polish graphic design and illustration. The exhibition didn’t just focus on the end product of the poster, the book, the plate, the magazine, etc but also on the creative process, which I found very interesting.
Although technology is often the go to for these skill sets and is ever more advanced, the creation of a new illustration or a new graphic design is often rooted in the hands-on craft of cutting, gluing, sketching and drawing. The exhibition showcased hand-made, hand-produced, and hand-thought. Three of my favourite are shown below not least because of the use of colour just made me heart sing.
Bożka Rydlewska is an illustrator and graphic artist. After graduating from the Academy of Fine Arts in Krakow, she moved to Sweden, to attend the School of Design and Crafts in Gothenburg and I’m sure I’m not the only person who thinks her work would look amazing on fabric.
Joanna Górska and Jerzy Skakun graduated from the Academy of Fine Arts in Gdańsk and soon after they started their own graphic studio called Homework. Their areas of expertise include graphic design for publications and posters as well as visual identity design for cultural events. This fantastic wallpaper would be amazing fun in a kids playroom or even a small w/c.
Kwiaty & Miut is a Poznań flower shop that creates one-of-a-kind floral compositions inspired by the beauty of nature. The flower shop’s founders Łukasz Marcinkowski and Radek Berent created this tableware pattern as a limited edition for the Bolesławiec company. The company has been making ceramics since the 14th century using a special variety of clay from the region in a distinctive blue colour. Totally beautiful and a very delicate take on a traditional blue and white pattern.
