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Championing creativity

Advertising • Animation • Art • Graphic Design • Illustration • Photography •

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New Originals: introducing the London Rollergirls

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Sponsored / Miscellaneous Adobe Creative Meetup London left us intrigued, excited, and inspired

As we stomped through the puddles on Great Portland Street on the kind of drizzly evening that sends central London back into a vision of a romanticised 1950s, the It’s Nice That team were desperate for innovation and invention. A glass of mulled wine wouldn’t have gone amiss either.

It's Nice That — 04 December 2018
Work / Miscellaneous Raw Color expands its colour-focused practice into 3D “props”

Colour theory is an essential component of the visual arts. The practice involves the process of mixing colours to create a complementary palette of colours. There is also an element of psychology within colour theory, as certain colours evoke particular emotions. Raw Color is an Eindhoven-based studio working between the disciplines of graphic design and photography. Its sophisticated studio output notably pays attention to the delicacy of colour. Through conducting experimental research, Raw Color has recently expanded its practice to make 3D objects as seen in the project, Props & Prints.

Jyni Ong — 23 November 2018
Work / Miscellaneous PlayLab, Inc. says it doesn't “want to do the same thing twice” in its practice

PlayLab, Inc. is a creative studio working across the disciplines of art, architecture and graphic design to bring innovative ideas and experiences to life. With a portfolio of over 240 projects executed since the studio’s inception in 2009, the New-York based practice takes on a variety of projects. From architectural branding to a compilation of all the times Joaquin Phoenix has walked in his films titled Walking Phoenix, this multidisciplinary studio is centred around strong concepts and intriguing visuals.

Jyni Ong — 14 November 2018
Sponsored / Miscellaneous We've picked our favourite entries from A/D/O's Water Future Design Challenge

Earlier in 2018, A/D/O launched the Water Futures Design Challenge. It was an attempt to get designers and creators to begin conceptualising and imagining innovative new ways in which we can start thinking about solutions to the (currently) toxic attitude many of us have toward drinking water. The crisis is now global, and A/D/O want each and every one of us to consider reimagining our destructive drinking water culture and contemplate designing alternative realities.

Sponsored Content — 11 October 2018
Work / Miscellaneous Palladian Dream: the corrupt, sin-worshipping chapel of the 21st century

The Western world is fascinated by sin. Whether it’s gluttony, envy or lust; healthy food fads, FOMO or sex scandals, narratives of sin provide a framework for how society prescribes cultural norms and defines what it means to be human. And no other institution encapsulates this obsession with immorality quite like the Catholic Church.

Daphne Milner — 08 October 2018
Work / Miscellaneous Asafo flags embody cultural meanings and narratives from Ghana’s Fante people

Barbara Eyeson, the creative director of Asafo Flags, has been collecting and researching the medium for ten years, currently working towards curating an exhibition in London showcasing the exquisite flags. Her family come from Fante’s tribes lining the southern coast of Ghana and Fante people live to the west of Accra, in fishing villages such as Anomabu, Saltpond, Mankessim, Elmina and in the town of Cape Coast. Traditionally, the flags, called Frankaa, are key items of Asafo regalia that adorn the central shrines of Fante villages. The cultural significance of Asafo flags still stands strong often displayed at different social events including festivals, ceremonies and festivals and “are still made and used today as an important part of communal life in Fante villages,” Barbara tells It’s Nice That.

Jyni Ong — 11 September 2018

Work / Animation Dante Zaballa's animation of Japan morphs through bullet trains and karaoke bars

“Turning a pile of paper into a video is always exciting,” states Argentinian animator Dante Zaballa. Currently based between Berlin and Buenos Aires, Dante’s work is imbued with energy and full of child-like charm and colour.

Ruby Boddington — 12 December 2018
Regulars / Review of the Year 2018 2018 was the year Ezra Miller learned to take care of his brain

It’s been a big year for creative polymath Ezra Miller. When we spoke to him back in September of this year, he’d recently collaborated with Adidas while taking a break from his studies at NYU. Since then he’s landed a huge job working alongside artist Jon Rafman for Balenciaga – a project which caught global attention at Paris Fashion Week in October – and has recently signed with creative agency MA+Creative.

Ruby Boddington — 12 December 2018
Work / Graphic Design Blok rethinks the design of cannabis after its legalisation in Canada

On 17 October, earlier this year, Canada became the second country in the world to legalise marijuana. Second, only to Uruguay, Canada is now the largest country in the world that legally sells the drug in a regulated system. Justin Trudeau’s government oversaw the turn in the law in an attempt to represent the changing stigma around marijuana, as well as prevent black market operations that persist in the rest of the world.

Jyni Ong — 12 December 2018
Work / Publication Peer behind the curtains of Christmas cinema with It's a Wonderful Lifetime

Christmas is the most sedentary of the holidays. This, obviously, is a good thing. After all, the occasional brief Boxing Day stroll aside, who wants to do much more than sit solidly on a sofa for what feels like an eternity, living off Maltesers, small bottles of living room temperature beer, and the saccharine sustenance that only Christmas films offer?

Josh Baines — 12 December 2018
Work / Publication “I’m a believer in form”: Geoff McFetridge on his new book of introspective drawings

Anyone who knows Geoff McFetridge’s work will know that his unique use of colour is often what makes his paintings particularly striking. Yet it turns out that reaching that final expression actually takes a lot of work involving very little colour at all. “The process for making the paintings involves doing a lot of work on paper,” the Los Angeles-based artist tells us. “The images are developed on paper by doing many drafts of the same images. So once I start to paint I am no longer thinking about the image, the entire focus becomes about colour.”

Matt Alagiah — 11 December 2018
Regulars / Nicer Tuesdays A rundown of our Nicer Tuesdays highlights of 2018

On the last Tuesday of every month this year, we and 400 other creative fanatics headed down to Oval Space in East London to watch four practitioners tell us about themselves and their work. With 44 talks done and four more to follow next week, this year’s Nicer Tuesdays has been full of often hilarious, sometimes serious but – ultimately – always insightful talks.

It's Nice That — 11 December 2018

Regulars / Review of the Year 2018 Eight creatives from around the world tell us what made their city tick in 2018

Here at It’s Nice That, we’re dedicated to keeping our approach to creativity resolutely global. As societies at large start to feel increasingly unstable, uncertain, and atomised, it is more important than ever to consider how to foster a sense of likemindedness across the creative industries, remembering that borders don’t have to exist in the way we’re told they do.

Josh Baines — 11 December 2018
Work / Illustration “Are we all avatars now?” asks digital painter Zak Keene

London-based illustrator Zak Keene trained as an architect and consequently has self-professed “OCD compulsions”. In architecture, “everything has to be precise to the millimetre”, Zak tells It’s Nice That. If measurements aren’t accurate, somewhere down the line “it could lead to big complications and the builders could call to say the staircase doesn’t reach the second floor!” Zak has become obsessed with the smallest details in his illustration work. His hyperreal digital drawings utilise architectural ratios that see the work totally to scale. When working, Zak asks himself, “am I drawing a 1:1, intimate close up of a hand clutching an object? Or am I drawing a zoomed out elevation encompassing an entire scene with figures against a landscape?”

Jyni Ong — 11 December 2018
Work / Photography Mohamad Abdouni on documenting an “important time in Arab queer culture”

“The way it currently stands, we as queer Arabs don’t have extensive (if any) documentation of our queer past and tend to refer to the West for reference and history,” explains Beirut born-and-raised photographer, filmmaker and editor-in-chief of Cold Cuts magazine, Mohamad Abdouni. Through both his commissioned and personal work, Mohamad is looking to change this fact, documenting the community he is apart of, and the culture it is beginning to thrive within.

Ruby Boddington — 11 December 2018
Sponsored / Product Design MUJI talks us through the brand’s famously minimal design aesthetic

MUJI may well be a recognisable high-street brand today but few people know much about the company’s history. The brand was born in 1980s Japan, when the country’s so-called “economic miracle” was coming to an end and people were massively cutting back on their spending. As the MUJI team puts it, the company was founded in this unique environment “as an antithesis to the habits of extreme consumer society”. It’s an ethos that still resonates today.

Sponsored Content — 11 December 2018
Work / Graphic Design Hitesh Malaviya on the challenges of designing type for an Indian audience

“I think India is the most diverse country in the world”, says freelance type designer Hitesh Malaviya. “We have 29 states and almost every state has a different language and culture. People in India currently speak about 780 languages, written in 11 different scripts.” Compared to type designers dealing with latin glyphs, designers like Rocky — as Hitesh is known to his friends — who design fonts for an Indian audience face the challenge of perfecting around 750 to 800 glyphs in each font and weight.

Jyni Ong — 11 December 2018
Regulars / Review of the Year 2018 Little Pyongyang director Roxy Rezvany reflects on what constitutes a successful year

You can’t have failed to notice North Korea’s presence in the news this year. With Donald Trump large and in charge from his Mar-a-Lago golf course and Kim Jong-Un burrowed away in deepest Pyongyang, it’s been 12 months of escalating tensions interspersed with the occasional period of quiet relief.

Josh Baines — 11 December 2018

Work / Graphic Design Multi-faceted designers Studio Bergini hops between projects with a cool, clean elegance

A few weeks back now, on a particularly gloomy Sunday, It’s Nice That found themselves ambling around Hackney Wick. We were on our way to a friend’s birthday party at a beanbag-filled audiophile bar and took a wrong turning. Nestled amongst the greys and browns of a part of London that’s still not quite sure how redeveloped it wants to be, we heard the gentle hum of old printers whirring away into the heavy afternoon air.

Josh Baines — 11 December 2018
Work / Illustration For Ginko Yang “drawing creates the same effects as a mental massage”

Designer Ginko Yang was born in a semitropical town of Southern China. A few years later, she spent five years in Beijing before embarking on a new creative adventure in London. But it seems that no matter where Ginko is based, the act of “drawing creates the same effects as a mental massage," she tells It’s Nice That, and, as a result, Ginko’s turned her attention away from graphic design to illustration, after years of working as a magazine designer.

Jyni Ong — 10 December 2018
Regulars / Review of the Year 2018 Pop culture powerhouse Bryan Rivera's 2018 in graphic design

New Yorker Bryan Rivera has had another huge year. A true pop culture powerhouse, his work has adorned some of 2018’s biggest records, with everyone from Post Malone to Nao being given a visual re-rub by one of the most in-demand designers working today.

Jyni Ong — 10 December 2018
Regulars / Review of the Year 2018 Don't worry, be angry: how politics and creativity collided in 2018

In the first of our Review of the Year op-eds, It’s Nice That editor Matt Alagiah casts an eye over the interplay between politics and creativity over the past 12 months.

Matt Alagiah — 10 December 2018
Work / Animation Maurice Andresen is reimagining Glasgow’s non-spaces as an ethereal world

“My practice focuses on the otherworldly," says Glasgow-based animator Maurice Andresen. The creation of ethereal environments and mystical characters is Maurice’s speciality as he merges hyper-real renders of urban landscapes with surreal, alien-like characters to create a sense of displacement amongst what we think we know.

Jyni Ong — 10 December 2018
Work / Publication Vice magazine's creative team talks us through its new and unexpectedly different redesign

Pretty much every magazine reader, writer, editor or designer has some kind of relationship with Vice. And, while considered a multi-media publishing conglomerate by most, its print iteration still has a relatively small team working hard to ensure the physical embodiment of Vice still has a publication fanatics seeking it out and picking it up.

Lucy Bourton — 10 December 2018

Work / Photography Julia Falkner and Lorena Hydeman document boys playing with gender for the first time

Through a series of events, housemates Julia Falkner and Lorena Hydeman found themselves styling the 11-year-old nephew of a friend in clothes from their suitcases, photographing him as he discovered a new world of gender expression. The experience proved formative – both for young Kai and the duo – and it sparked what would become Julia (a photographer) and Lorena’s (a stylist) recently released series Blah Blah Genitals.

Ruby Boddington — 10 December 2018
Work / Photography Max Miechowski’s sun-drenched photos reveal the strength of diverse communities

“This summer was just a dream, and I hope that these images help to capture a little bit of that,” says photographer Max Miechowski of his latest series Burgess Park. “After moving to southeast London in 2017, Burgess Park became one of my favourite places in the city,” he continues. “The atmosphere there is like nothing I had experienced before, and I felt drawn to spend time in the park and to photograph the space and its community.”

Ruby Boddington — 07 December 2018
Work / Publication Bigfoot News is a self-published news bulletin for the homeless, by the homeless

Despite the fact that Stuart Perkins is homeless, over the past seven years he has used whatever default resources available, to maintain a creative practice in the form of a news bulletin about homelessness titled Bigfoot News. A champion of self-publishing, Stuart uses internet cafes and Microsoft Publisher, along with a whole load of hand-collaging to create his bulletins that truly embody the spirit of an independent practice.

Jyni Ong — 07 December 2018
Work / Publication Robert Darch's series The Moor argues that we are already living in dystopia

The notion of a dystopian society has long provided inspiration for writers, filmmakers and artists. There was of course, George Orwell’s media and information controlled-world in 1984, Anthony Burgess’ satirical and dark exploration of ultra-violent youth culture in A Clockwork Orange, and Masamune Shirow’s mind hacking cyborg-filled Japan in A Ghost in the Shell. The world conjured up in photographer Robert Darch’s upcoming book, The Moor, however, feels much closer to home – and far more imminent.

Ruby Boddington — 07 December 2018
Regulars / Friday Mixtape Friday Mixtape: Benedikt Luft's mix of tunes from his teenage years

Frankfurt-based illustrator and designer Benedikt Luft has been a long time friend of us here at It’s Nice That. Writing about his practice over the years, it wasn’t until we went to Eike König’s After School Club in Benedikt’s home during the summer that he ended up telling us about his love for music. He might have even been dragged into singing a karaoke rendition of The Smiths Bigmouth Strikes Again to an audience of attendees, who then cleared the room, with us too… sorry Eike and everyone who witnessed that.

Lucy Bourton — 07 December 2018
Work / Printed Pages Sophie Koko Gate on illustrating social media’s influence on art criticism

“Social media is changing how we think, talk, and write about art — but is it doing it for the better?”

Jyni Ong — 07 December 2018

Work / Set Design Anna Rhodes on designing a time-travelling set for Oscar Hudson's new Absolut advert

Art director and production designer, Anna Rhodes, has a real knack for designing sets for films, adverts and music videos that look inconspicuously real. It’s Anna’s job to take a viewer out of the mindset of watching a staged production and make it look coaxingly real. Through thorough research and a lot of experience, Anna’s the kind of art director who knows what difference a certain prop can make in evoking a time, place or feeling. For Absolut’s new advert, The Walk directed by Oscar Hudson, Anna was tasked with designing not just a room but a whole street travelling through decades of design in New York – and you fully believe it.

Lucy Bourton — 06 December 2018
Work / Graphic Design Shun Ishizuka's designs combine Western design influences for a Japanese context

Shun Ishizuka never trained in graphic design. While studying literature at Tokyo’s Waseda University Shun started making flyers for his friends. Since this springboard into print, he’s worked in commercial design making paraphernalia such as cards, invitations and envelopes, and currently works as a freelance designer in the cultural sector. “Now I’m working with musicians, artists, curators and theatre companies”, Shun tells It’s Nice That. “I’m lucky that my clients are all interesting creatives. We collaborate very closely which means I’m free to work in an experimental way," tackling most of the supporting visuals for his client’s work.

Jyni Ong — 06 December 2018
Work / Illustration Alex Gamsu Jenkins’ comics remind us of how gross we really are

Illustrator Alex Gamsu Jenkins’ latest works are absolutely gross. But in the way we’re all gross, spot popping, alarm ignoring, sleepy, procrastinating people deep down. Earlier in the year, we caught up with Alex on his surreal one-panel personal works and now the south London-based illustrator has expanded these pieces into short comics and the results will have you in stitches as your eyes flip across each panel of four.

Lucy Bourton — 06 December 2018
Work / Publication Hart Lëshkina builds a surreal version of reality in its photographs

Based in Los Angeles, Tati and Erik AKA Hart Lëshkina is a photographic duo who – over the past four and a half years – has established a dream-like and surreal world for its subjects to inhabit. At times ambiguous and often imbued with a sense of melancholy, the pair has an innate ability to fabricate and construct realities.

Ruby Boddington — 06 December 2018
Work / Publication Urban Pamphleteer #7 shares narratives from London's LGBTQ+ night-time spaces

Issue seven of Urban Pamphleteer gathers “perspectives, provocations and vignettes on London’s LGBTQ+ night-time spaces”. The publication was founded in 2013 by Rebecca Ross and Ben Campkin as an experiment into “the boundaries and public-ness of university-based publishing.” Now in its seventh issue, the magazine continues the tradition of radical pamphleteering, confronting themes in contemporary urban debate from a wide range of perspectives. With an aim to empower and inform citizens to “positively shape change”, Rebecca and Ben discuss the latest issue of Urban Pamphleteer, which they co-edited with Lo (Laura) Marshall.

Jyni Ong — 06 December 2018
Regulars / Printed Pages Printed Pages AW18 feat. Sascha Lobe, Alex Prager, Hassan Hajjaj and more is out now

Good news! Printed Pages AW18 hits the shelves of bookshops around the world today. As always, this latest issue is our curated view of the best creative work we’ve seen in the past six months.

It's Nice That — 06 December 2018

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