Last week I had a small photoshoot of my artworks to promote Zetta Florence folios. The folio is a compulsory purchase for every RMIT communication designer students’ last semester of uni – it is one of the highest quality folios on the market that professionally presents your work without getting unwanted fingerprints and mess on each sheet. It’s recommended we bring these to any design interview but at first glance, it looked more suited to showcasing art pieces than design work. With that impression in mind, I decided to use it as proper storage for my artworks.
Presenting artworks neatly to investors and clients is a very daunting thing to do, especially when you don’t have the right folio for it. Zetta does the job. The traditional folio with a bind doesn’t cut it due to it’s limited nature with providing the best viewing experience for yourself and the viewer. Instead, the best option is to have loose sheets and let the viewer carefully examine each piece in whichever order they prefer. The Zetta folio is known for being a hand-made leather box protecting individual sheets inside. Even though mine have no clamps to hold the sheets together, the sheets are incredibly durable and don’t move around as much as you think – in fact they fit perfectly inside and don’t move around at all! The polypropylene sheets are purchased separate to the box and in bulk. They’re definitely not your average A3 plastic pockets. They’re heavily coated and designed to conserve your artwork for as long as possible, meaning the artwork will never fade and lose its color.
I’m happy uni introduced us to Zetta or else I would’ve spent many more years trying to find better ways of preserving my art. It’s also perfect for my future travels, I don’t have to worry too much of it being smudged or crumpled in my luggage. Thank you for answering my prayers Zetta Florence.
Credits: Judy Christine
One of the things I love to do in my spare time is go through messages people send me of their work inspired by my art or emails requesting to use my me for their art project. I really appreciate these as it makes my life as an artist extra fulfilling. I recently Skyped with a senior high school student from Myanmar who wanted to interview me for her art assignment and it’s great feeling to know we got along well through sharing common interests in kpop and holidaying in the US. One of the questions that sparked me the most is “what do you think the role of an artist is?”. There was probably a long pause after that as I was wondering how to construct my sentence….it’s an easy but not so easy question to answer. My understanding of this role changes overtime based on experience: I think the role of an artist is to entertain while using it to make a good living. Witnessing works by other people inspired by my own art is my form of making a “good living” through art.
Credits: Liz
Credits: Jamie Barnes
I enjoy being interviewed because I get to be challenged with all these questions that I don’t usually think about, plus I get to know myself better (ironic!). What I’m noticing the most out of these interviews is that people often wonder what kind of person I am or what I do when I’m not drawing or designing. I thought this would be fun, here’s a list of 15 random things you should know about me:
1. I’m allergic to dust and so is my Mom so we find ourselves cleaning a lot….from tidying up rooms to wiping down specs of dust on my macbook keyboard. You name it!
2. I prefer drawing over painting as I can’t get technical with painting. That said, I don’t draw everyday.
3. But I design everyday. I’m a workaholic that works way past 9 to 5.
4. The very first “cool” gadget I ever got was the 1st gen iPod shuffle and since then I’ve always stuck to using Apple products. Apple has made me love music from the very beginning, as well as design 😀
5. I like sport. I’d probably be an ambitious badminton or tennis player as another chosen career path.
6. Not a fan of celery and coriander.
7. My ideal workspace is my bedroom. My desk is cosy and spacious enough for me to do my typical A3 drawings.
8. I’m a city person.
9. I value first impressions the most rather than waiting for something amazing to happen. This applies to everything.
10. For some girls they can’t go out without makeup. For me, I can’t go out without a bow headband.
11. I secretly critique menu designs when I’m at a restaurant.
12. My favorite tv shows are Breaking Bad, Masterchef, Orange is the New Black and The Walking Dead.
13. I’m crazy about fonts.
14. I usually buy magazines for the design and layout rather than for the content itself.
15. My dream project would be to collaborate with Burberry and Big Bang or 2NE1.
Colors from left to right: Tokyo Koi, Saigon Sunset, Bali Breeze, Hong Kong Harbour, Tahiti Pearls.
The Pacific Collection is in town baby! Exurbe released their Spring / Summer 2015 nailvarnish range a few weeks ago at the Fashion Hotel in Zurich. You can see my artwork for the collection here and on the Exurbe Cosmetics website (still under development). The project kicked off as soon as I came back from my holiday in Indonesia and Singapore and Melissa from Exurbe had already talked about plans of doing a seascape, summer-y theme. Basing it off the moodboard below, the idea struck me of naming the five colors after vibrant cities we’ve been to. They were places that evoked a strong trademark color relevant to the colors shown in the moodboard.
The process was quick! The artwork was done in a matter of days and all that was left to do is send the piece off to the nail varnish laboratory, scan it and do some color calibrating. The computer detects 5 common color tones used in my artwork, from there it sends all that data to a machine that produces sample pigments.
Awesome to see Tokyo Koi and Bali Breeze as bestsellers from the collection. Saigon Sunset is also one of my favorites! While Exurbe do sell other makeup products, they’re a company that specializes in vegan-friendly nail polish. They have a strong market audience in Europe and are seeking to expand their brand by partnering up with artists from every corner of the world. I’m looking forward to seeing who the next artist is for the next collection…it could actually be someone reading this post 😀
A right-brainer by day and occasional blogger by night, you've landed on a place where I live and breathe all things art, design, culture and fashion. You'll find me documenting my life in the creative field, endless travels with friends and family and a bit of food.