30 Years of Nike Basketball Shoes

This is poster I found through a sneaker campaign, it’s poster advertising the Nike Vandal, a basketball sneaker produced by Nike in 1985. A graphic designer and illustrator called Billie Jean produced this poster.


This piece was produced for a recent campaign made by Nike, to re-launch the Nike Vandal. It maintains to keep the ‘old school’ style, as it incorporates images from the 80s such as the iconic space invader alien, and cubes that could represent a Rubix cube. The artist uses a biro pen to complete, giving the impression that this creative piece was created by a student, who may have just been doodling in a boring class. The artist made the Nike Vandal the center piece compared to the small scaled drawings around the sneaker, The number ’85’ is also emphasized to give a clear message of the year the shoe was made. The artist has also incorporated a surrealism ideal to the piece, as the shoelaces are seen going into a wild bundle and final ending up into hands. Visual images used such as basketball players are quite obvious to the purpose, although the use of a peace sign, heart and an American Bulldog is not so obvious, but we can assume that the mid 80s were a very live and happy decade.

The media used by Billie Jean was a biro pen, although it looks like some elements were transferred onto a photo editing software to add the peace sign and the small sticker, which has a picture of the actual shoe. The artist has also used cross hatching techniques to add tone to the shoe giving it a 3D look.

Pioneer

Pioneer

This is an advert poster of a new flat screen T.V.  It’s called the Pioneer KURO, I found this piece on the Internet and I thought it would be good for my school project blog.  This advert campaign by Pioneer was published in 2008.  The executive creative director was Lee Clow, a well-established advertiser. Part of his team was his executive director Jerry Gentile, copywriter Gage Clegg, is responsible for the text and slogan of this advertising campaign “seeing and hearing like never before”.  I think the media used in this piece uses Photoshop and after effects.

This type of advertisement is called, aggressive advertising, a definition of aggressive advertising is when it advertises in a bold manner to the public. It uses a black and white photograph with a gothic and mysterious theme.  I think the artists used a black and white theme, to illustrate sophistication, simplicity, stylish and classic, and I think this is what the artist is trying to portray for this new model of flat screen T.V.  I think the use of a hand with an eye in the middle of the psalm and ear loaves represents a new form of surround sound system developed by THX 5:1.

I think the media used is Photoshop, illustrator or photo editing software to create the effects of this piece.  The image is a photomontage, with half of the poster being the main visual piece of the hand, and the other with the description along with an image of the T.V.  Cultural influences of North African religious belief of an eye in the psalm symbolize Hamsa, where it’s believed to protect the person from the evil eye. 

Social Work Advert

Dave McKean

Dave McKean is a graphic designer, illustrator, photographer and comic book artist, born on the 29th December 1963 in Maidenhead, Berkshire. Many of his works consist of paintings, photographs, collages, digital art and sculptures.
He’s works are contemporary with modern elements. I was interested in David McKean’s work after coming across his artwork through the Internet. I thought it would be great research to contribute in my school project, which is to create an Internet Blog


One of his artwork, which I’ll be analyzing, is Dave McKean’s ‘Social Work Advert’. The artwork is based on the isolation of a disabled person and how a social worker helped. It’s been generalized under a character called Sonya who was born with mild spinal damage. The main reason for using the work is the consistent use of symbolism.


The main symbolism of a map in the background shows the journey, which Sonya takes to break her isolation. The use of a signpost at the top of the poster shows Sonya’s lost in direction, a photograph of Sonya while she was young is very old and indicates her years of being disabled.


As we read down the poster following it almost like a comic book. It shows how Sonya from being a young child in the photograph, now spends her time as a 37-year-old disabled lady, just mainly watching T.V. and a statement ‘mum did so much for her maybe too much’ is a bold statement showing that Sonya has lost her independence. Her mother dies and this is symbolized as gravestones on the map background. The door symbolizes Sonya in full isolation and wasn’t too comfortable to open up.


The symbol of Coronation Street shows that both Sonya and the social worker had something in common; it was almost like an open door for the social worker to be able to enter and gain Sonya’s trust. The social worker was also able to persuade Sonya to meet with other people in her case, with the condition that Sonya has to take a taxi to the meetings, meaning she was still uncomfortable with the rest of the public, but had showed progress.


The highlight of the piece is the bright red bus, where Sonya is highlighted riding it, It also shows a compass symbolizing that Sonya has found her way, it can be contrasted with the image at the top of the poster of a sign post. On the map it also shows houses symbolizing the houses of people who used to be in her case.


The artist is trying to communicate how social work could be so important to a person’s life that may be lost in this World. The media used could have been Photoshop, illustrator or any other photo editing software. I can suggest illustrator due to the path type text done at the bottom of the poster.


I think in today’s World, many disabled people are disregarded and could feel isolated from the public causing depression and isolation; the artist tries to illustrate how social work could improve someone’s life.

God Save the Queen

Jamie Reid made this poster in 1977, for the album cover of the Sex Pistols. The Sex Pistols were a British Punk Rock band. Jamie Reid is British artist who mainly uses, cut up letters from newspaper headlines that resembled from a ransom note, he’s one of the artist who defined the punk rock image.

This album cover is based on a photograph of Queen Elizabeth II by photographer Cecil Beaton. It’s a very iconic image as it defaces the Queen’s face with this cut out letters from newspapers, which covers the mouth and the eyes of the Queen in the photograph. At the time this was very shocking and controversial, as nobody would have thought to deface the Queen’s face, the content of the song was also as controversial, which meant that the BBC and Independent Broadcasting Agency had refused to play the song by the Sex Pistols. I think the purpose for defacing the Queen’s face was to show how the punk era, was very unique, stubborn and uncontrollable. Almost like the music genre, and the teenagers who may have been rebelliously following the punk culture. The use of a cut out letters from newspapers being spelt out in a famous anthem ‘God save the Queen’ which is normally sang by the British Commonwealths was used to defaced the Queen, although it wasn’t intentioned to shock and revolt against the Queen or Britain, it was actually said to praise and sympathised with the British people, mainly aimed at the British working class.  I think the media used was a British flag with a photograph of the Queen, with the newspaper letter cut outs collaged into the picture of the Queen. Then it was captured on photograph from a birds eye view, I can guess this was the process as there’s still folds and shadows seen on the flag.

I think this piece has historical links to the punk culture during the late 70s and early 80s, during which there were many people against the Government and poverty and unemployment were at an increase, especially with the working classes of Britain. The piece emphasises on the rebellious side of punk and how openly they expressed their opinions on the World around the time.  

Intolerance Destroys The Fabric of Americaa

Jenny Tran

I chose this piece as its interesting, especially as it has a very dark and mysterious element. This piece is called ‘Intolerance destroys the fabric of America’ the artist who created this is called Jennifer Tran; she's of American Vietnamese background. It's an image of the section of the American flag distorted in the centre, almost like the fabric are being worn out and the threads are falling apart and creating a hole. 

The theme of the artwork is dark and the artist is trying to give a very surreal image to communicate the seriousness of the theme of segregation and intolerance that occurs in modern America. The sentence which clearly projects what’s happening in the art works is being communicated through the way the fabric looks like it’s falling apart and how the words are incorporated and not clear for the viewer to read. I think the story behind the work is how a land can contain so many types of people and yet segregation and intolerance between each different people is so high in American communities. The whole art piece is based on the American flag that's slowly losing its threads and it's creating the flag to fall apart. The message is incorporated in the fabric of the flag, which is slowly falling apart in the centre, symbolising that it's deep in America where the problem is. The Flag is quite dark and dirty which suggest impurities in the American nation. The artist tries to communicate her opinions of America through this flag. I think the artist used an image editing program to create this piece, as it is has a modern and computerised effect, especially with how the cross hatching effect, which uses a written sentence in a small font size so create thin lines that gives the fabric falling apart effect.

‘Intolerance destroys the fabric of America’ is a modern artwork. I think it has influences of how in modern times, the American people have criticised its Government and their actions in international affairs. I think the artwork speaks for the opinions of the majority but it’s just another internal problem that is hard to resolve.