Last weekend I headed down to London to have a look-see at the Free Range Art & Design Show, located in and around the Old Truman Brewery on uber-trendy Brick Lane. I didn’t realize that there was just a handful of colleges exhibiting, but the format seemed to work a bit better than the New Blood (which I’ll definitely be returning to London for at the end of the month), allowing each course to take up whole rooms, or in the case of Middlesex, most of the top floor, rather than a single stand among hundreds. This gave each student’s work plenty of room to catch my attention, though I found myself visually overloaded, as I always seem to at these type of exhibitions (so many nice things!).
True to form I totally failed to do any of the work I did manage to photograph justice, but you know what, if you want to see it, get your arse down to Brick Lane and drink it in. The courses will be rotating every week for the rest of June, so there’s plenty of new stuff to look at.
I’ve also been totally biased towards my old college, the University for the Creative Arts at Maidstone, but they’ve put together a great show with the title of Design Market. They’ve also put together an impressive newspaper-style prospectus, which is a cut above your usual show brochure. Above you can see a really cracking book made by Peter Barnes, a lush investigation into the history of letterpress, with some beautiful photos and delicate typography. Being a type geek I was very impressed by this (kudos to Nath for the hand-modelling).
These series of photos by Sarah Winter show a selection of quotes from inspirational historical figures, not the most original idea, but really nicely executed.
I really enjoyed the scope of some of the projects on display, especially (I’m afraid to say) Goldsmith’s, who’ve really been pushing the boundries and definition of ‘design’. Check out Alex Kassian’s Design 4 Bees, a very topical investigation which I thought was very thoroughly executed.
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