TABLE BIRDS

It is the intention of the author Brent Hardy-Smith of the blog Table Birds to present an account of the work produced in response to a self initiated brief that has been set for the duration of the masters stage of a masters in Design and Art Direction at Manchester Metropolitan University .

Brent Hardy-Smith is a practicing illustrator and full time design educator at the University of Huddersfield.

An interactive printing event has been created in response to the web based campaign site for

Chicken out.

It has been an intention to investigate if the practice of illustrating can be better utilised by the Web/Internet.

As a starting point the author would like to introduce a quote and passage from his Learning agreement;

‘Illustration must either elucidate the text or adorn it. It may do both: sometimes it does neither.’
Frank Weitenkampf 1919

One of the earliest examples of the historical practice of illustration is The Illuminated Manuscripts. These contained sequences of pictures that formed visual commentary on its text.

Illustration through the centuries has continuously performed such commentary on text but has diversified out into areas of text such as newspapers, editorial, publishing, advertising and more recently websites.

The above three posters were produce for the charity organization by a collaboration between The Light of Life Foundation, ad agency Lowe NY and the Illustrator Keith Negley.

Many processes for illustrating coexist to service the areas of text and can strongly suggest the look of a period in history. For example illustration styles may have ‘a fifties print or a Victorian engraved’ look to them.

The practice of illustration can be executed by utilizing a variety of traditional and new artist materials. From painting to drawing mediums, wood block to engraving and new digital image production software packages.

All techniques serve a purpose in the assisting of producing illustrations that perform the functions of being instructional, informational, erudite, elaborate, entertaining, amusing and probably many more.

Websites are interactive by nature and thus utilise an animated image as opposed to a static 2D illustration. The Internet is predominantly utilised by illustrators to showcase work produced for more traditional print based markets for illustration.

With this knowledge the author decided to adopt an art direction approach to the self initiated brief with the intention of commissioning himself to produce the illustrations. The decision to adopt an art direction persona is to enable the author to gain a deeper understanding of the processes a commissioner of illustration possibly adheres to and help investigate the working practice of commissioning illustration work.

The author discovered the Jean Marie Dru’s Disruption technique and decided to utilise the technique to produce a strategy for the Chicken out campaign.

What is the Disruption technique?

Synopsis by Barnes & Noble.com

To put it simply, disruption is about uncovering the culturally embedded biases and conventions that shape standard approaches to business thinking and get in the way of clear, creative thinking. It's about shattering those biases and conventions and setting creativity free to forge a radical new vision of a product, brand, or service. It's about spearheading change rather than reacting to it.

In Disruption, Dru shows you how to harness the enormous potential of this concept. He introduces innovative strategies for breaking down creative barriers and shows you how to analyze traditional approaches from new perspectives. Next, he provides valuable tools for identifying and cataloguing conventions, including "what if," "multicultural analysis," and the "disruption bank." He then demonstrates-with the help of dozens of galvanizing examples from around the world-how to apply this knowledge systematically to create innovative competitive strategies, marketing campaigns, and operations plans that can revitalize your company or department.

What is the strategy that the author produced by utilising the disruption technique?

After studying the text for the online Chicken Out campaign I decided that the campaign could benefit from it’s participants being given a chance to be more active or act as activists. Not activists in the sense of animal welfare protesters kidnapping workers that worked in animal experiment centers. This would damage the image of the Chicken Out campaign by being associated with this type of action. I decided to coin a phrase “The Art of Protesting” and by this I intend to tap into an emerging and blossoming craft scene being developed on line by such blogs and groups as the Make Lounge and Etsy

As a direct response to the comments and feedback from running my Illustrated in full colour throughout blog where people were nostalgic and comforted by re discovering illustrated gems from there past and spoke of having personal relationships with images from there childhood in particular.

I decided to combine protesting by producing illustrations that have vintage patterns as there starting point.

It soon became apparent that the protest or production of the protest must be a reward for the participant this is based on observations that successful websites offer the participant a benefit by interacting with them rather than just being a place to give information.

The proposal for an event is to offer the participant the chance to engage with the text of the online Chicken Out campaign by:

• Asking the participant to produce a protest banner at the event.

• To select the type illustration to use on the banner.

• To choose which type of table bird they would like to protest about.

• To offer a choice at every stage of the banner production.

• To leave the venue with the banner and by this very action to be active by protesting in a public space at some point by the very fact that they are carrying a protest banner.

• To engage other people with the Chicken Out campaign and direct them to sign up on-line.

imaged sourced from amazon

It is the intention that the protester is considered to be a cultured art collector a trend spotter/setter and a part of a wider cultural artistic movement “refer to blogs”. If other people that come into contact with the produced banners have the desire to own a banner for it’s artistic merits then as a payment for the artefact they would hopefully sign up to the on-line campaign and feel that by supporting they have the right to own the artefact. This is the strategy developed by studying the Disruption technique. It is intended that this approach does not detract from the facts of the animal welfare issue being protested about but brings a cultural change through the appreciation of art created in support of the animal welfare issue and elevates the protest away from the “Kidnapping protesting perceptions”.
How did the author produce it?

To facilitate the production and staging of the proposed event I have had to produce a series of illustrations in direct response to the text produced for the Chicken Out campaign utilising

“Sun on their backs”

and “Factory Farming”

to produce iconic illustrations.
Text would be utilised to produce a border effect with the text also being decorative in its visual appearance so as to avoid a confrontation with the eye.

The initial intention was to produce a silk-screening facility but this was deemed to be too complicated and labour intensive for an event, this is when the title of “Table Birds” was considered to be a process as well as the name given to chickens produced for consumption. “Table” made me think about table top publishing and how this is now more widely available to the general public, this suited the notion of protesting and being in control of what you do as an individual “free to think for yourself and engage with others”.

To use an actual table to produce protest banners about table birds seemed to be a fortunate and logical process to engage with. It also has a feeling of early printing presses and the notion of “the People” spreading the “word” to the masses without censorship or interference from “the state/government”.

I was concerned that such a basic archaic device may detract from the notion of an on-line campaign; this is when I realised that in order to produce a printing press table I would have to engage with and use modern digital technologies to produce this as a printing facility. This process keeps the digital edge to the campaign and asks a question about how much of an artisan are designers in this age of perceived technical wizardry? Is digital a craft?

I have engaged with a variety of art direction practices during the PG CERT AND Diploma stages that have enabled me to put into practice an art directed project for the Masters stage that utilizes the practice of illustration as it’s main visual communication platform. These are as follows:

• Time management

1. Setting boundaries/ parameters, these act as a means to focus on what needs to be achieved “a critical path”. Without the boundaries the project becomes too open and its direction can become derailed and change direction on a “whim” rather than a considered and researched/developed outcome. The boundaries act as a tool that can be utilised as a creative aid or an evaluation means with which to pursue an outcome for a projects lifespan.

2. Setting a timetable at the beginning facilitates art direction to evolve.

3. The set timetable must remain flexible to allow for research to continuously inform the response to the brief.

4. Allowing time to experiment with methods of inquiry and strategies of thought along with practicing with processes.

5. Organising time to offer input from peers and the target audience.

6. Allowing realistic and generous production and testing time that will facilitate for continuous experimentation.

• Adopting a research methodology
• Identifying collaborators.
• Being open and flexible to respond to findings from research and testing time.
• Research production techniques and processes to utilise as idea generation tools.
• Engaging with historical and new pioneering communication design practices.
• Engaging with historical and new pioneering practices form other fields of practice other than design practice for example “the sciences”

The practice of animation will continue to provide an online interactive service to the Internet. As a direct result from engaging with all of the above practices I can conclude that the practice of illustrating can exist with the Internet as more than a supplier of images that illustrate bodies of text. Illustration in association with art direction can achieve a uniquely interactive and tactile relationship with text for the consumers of the information available on the Internet. This is possible by utilising current and future technologies to give text a physical existence outside of its confinement of being only available to be read and or interacted with on screen.

The production and staging of this event for the Chicken out campaign is testament to these claims.

Finally I have re-engaged and continue to practice as an illustrator as a direct result of studying Art Direction and have researched and developed a contemporary illustration style that has provided personal confidence to develop new relationships for the Internet with the practice of Illustrating.