New Blood!

Last week(ish) I was lucky enough to attend D&DA's annual New Blood exhibition and had a great time with some amazing and exciting outcomes and lots of really wonderful feedback and interesting constructive criticism.
It was super cool.

As well as getting to talk with some industry people I got to meet some of the crazy talented illustrators and designers who were exhibiting.
We were positioned opposite Falmouth uni so I pretty much fell in love with ALL of their stuff. So many beautiful books! Amongst my favourites were:

Ella Bailey's beautiful style and characters:

Juliet Harris' illustration for Philip Pullmans 'The firework maker's daughter.'
I love the limited pallet and dreamlike feel, couldn't stop wandering over and staring at it.

I also got the chance to talk to Falmouths Martha Anne who created these illustrations based on the Karma Sutra and is a genuinely lovely person. (And has great colour style!)

And with Jonny Clapham, who's weirdly wonderful and unique illustrations are well worth a gander. 

not to mention his hilarious messed up videos: 

7 Tips for Creative Graduates from Jonny Clapham on Vimeo.

I have it on good authority that some of the guys off my course are collaborating with him to produce a zine and I can not wait!

My other picks include this ingenious bike 'accessory' by Joe Waterfield to promote a charity bike ride:

(Look at the clouuds!)

Cedi Cycles - The Iron Curtain from Joe Waterfield on Vimeo.

And finally my favourite book of the show 'My Dads better than your Dad' by Claire Paul. This thing had me grinning from ear to ear by the time I finished it. Great little story and who doesn't like cute mustachioed cacti? (huhu mustachioed...)

Asides from all the great memories, fun times and lessons learnt what I'm going to remember most is something an incredibly drunk man told us in a club in shoreditch. He asked us if we'd won and we told him that we hadn't entered anything to which he replied 'You're here at new blood. You made it. You won!' 
I was four pints in so it probably sounded like inspired drunken poetry but that and the fantastic hipster dance off were what I remembered in the morning and it still makes me smile. 

I have to stop ending my blog posts on gooey feelings. ugh.

also! I ran out of business cards but the replacements seemed to go down well. Ever the professional.