London College of Communication - Head of College

Congratulations to London College of Communication (LCC) students from the FdA Design for Graphic Communication and BA (Hons) Graphic & Media Design courses on their recent success in this year’s International Society of Typographic Designers (ISTD) Student Assessment scheme.

The ISTD is a global organisation that works closely with graphic design educators and professionals to maintain and promote typographic standards through the forum of debate and design practice across the world.

The ISTD Student Assessment is rigorous in that it considers the overall design process of research, reflection, strategy, design development, technical and production specification of a project – not just the final proposal. Therefore, membership is only awarded to those who through their work demonstrate their commitment to achieving the highest possible quality of visual communication.

This year, four of the College’s students have been awarded entry into this globally respected society for their contributions of excellent typographic merit, they are:

Asa Elmehed, 2^nd Year FdA Design for Graphic Communication.

Kira Slepchenkova, 2^nd Year FdA Design for Graphic Communication.

Jay Jung Hyun Yeo, 3^rd Year Graphic & Media Design.

Caroline Claisse, 3^rd Year Graphic & Media Design.

The students, along with their tutors Paul Bailey, Jack Blake and David Phillips, will receive their certificates at a special event hosted in London this coming June.

To find out more about the ISTD Student Assessment Scheme, visit – http://www.istd.org.uk/education

Five London College of Communication (LCC) students will be exhibiting their work at the Menier Gallery, London Bridge, from Tuesday 1 – Saturday 5 May, the final stop of UAL Platform’s touring exhibition, Xhibit 2012.

Now in its 15^th year, Xhibit aims to find the crème de la crème of current student work from all over the University of the Arts London (UAL) and has been touring around London since March, starting off at Central Saint Martin’s, then on to the Kingsgate Workshop Trust in North London, before arriving at the Menier Gallery in South London.

This year a record breaking 1,200 works were submitted for inclusion, which were then  narrowed down to just 21 by an expert judging panel consisting of Student Union President -  Ben Westhead, Creative Director of JaguarShoesCollective – Vickie Hayward Creative Director of JaguarShoesCollective and Gallery Manager and Curator at Jerwood Visual Arts – Sarah Williams.

The five participating LCC students,  are:

Brett Mortensen (Foundation Art & Design)

Joao Monteiro (MA Graphic Moving Image)

Natalie Dawkins (MA Photography)

Ginevra Boni (BA Animation)

Sam Wrigley (BA Graphic and Media Design)

In addition, both Natalie & Joao were awarded the opportunity to curate an exhibition of their own work in the renowned DreamBagsJaguarShoes venue in Shoreditch later this year.

Xhibit is also proud to be collaborating with Made in Arts London, a new enterprise from the University of Arts London, selling art and design work by current students and recent graduates online. All works on sale in Xhibit 2012 are available to purchase at www.madeinartslondon.com as well as at a pop up shop at the Menier Gallery during the Private View on Tuesday 1^st, Friday 4^th and Saturday 5^thMay.

Please join us for the private view of Xhibit 2012 at The Menier Gallery, 51 Southwark Street, London SE1 1RU, Tuesday 1 May 2012, 6pm – 8pm.

The exhibition is open Tuesday 1 – Saturday 5 May 2012

Tues – Thurs: 11am – 6pm
Fri: 11am – 8pm
Sat: 11am – 4pm

Students from London College of Communication (LCC) MA Interactive Media have produced six mind-blowing projects that will have you rubbing your eyes in disbelief.

The exhibition, Beyond the Blink will be held in room M104 here at LCC and will showcase a series of ‘physical computing’ works that will  not only dazzle and delight but also pose some difficult and challenging questions.

Doing away with the screen, mouse and keyboard, the participating students will present a series of interactive installations, each telling stories that can only be completed with your help.

Questioning our relationships in an increasingly technological age, projects such as Hold me Tender and Hug-a-bot contemplate just how far would you go for real affection?

Futhermore, All for one, one for all will see visitors work as a team to control a single character in a game that rewards collaboration whereas Wavetable, an audio reactive installation, converts sound into visuals making the invisible noise all around tangible and real.

Intrigued? Those exhibition details again are:

Dates: Tuesday 1 – Wedsnesday 2 May 2012
Time: 10.30am to 8pm Monday, 10.30am to 2pm, Tuesday
Location: Room M104, LCC, SE1 6SB

London College of Communication (LCC) associate lecturer in media Jeff Robins and former LCC tutor and graduate Graham Diprose have launched their new textbook Photography: The New Basics.

Four years in the making, the book features many images from LCC students past and present featuring work from Foundation level through to Post Grad. The LCC Alumnus’ comprehensive textbook tackles the basics of getting the best out of your digital camera, through to experimental photography and practical exercises to test what you’ve learnt.

The book, published by Thames & Hudson, is out now – http://www.thamesandhudson.com/9780500289785.html

Applications close 5pm Friday 18 May.

http://myblog.arts.ac.uk/del2012/my-digital-life/

London College of Communication (LCC) MA Publishing graduate Paula Merlo has been busy helping launch celebrity gossip magazine ‘Glamour’ in Brazil.

Paula, who graduated in 2011, has been assigned editor of the magazine’s ‘Do’s and Don’ts’ feature as well as working on features about sex, relationships, health and careers.

Speaking of her time at LCC, Paula enthuses:

“Studying an MA in Publishing at LCC has played an essential part in getting me to where I am today. The MA helped me to mature my ideas and understand the scope of cross-media, multi-platform publishing, social media and online content; all of which we debated at length in class.”

Paula made the most of her time studying in London, interning at beauty brand ‘Eyeko’ and Luxure Magazine. She also contributed regularly to Vogue Brazil as their London correspondent, where she had worked previously for five years.

Paula’s time at LCC culminated with the production of ‘Yuppie’, a magazine she worked on with fellow students as a major MA practice project, of which she says:

“Producing Yuppie really helped me to get the attention of editors when seeking job interviews in London. Potential employers saw how well crafted Yuppie was, with real and relevant content, and immediately responded to it. I still receive emails from people who want to contribute to the magazine and website!”

Glamour Brazil officially launch in April 2012, immediately receiving a circulation of over 200,000 copies.

Look out for Paula as the Glamour Brazil team let their hair down after a busy day in the office:

London College of Communication (LCC) BA Photography graduates Norman Wilcox, Amanda Johansson and Ronan Haughton have been featured in a newly published book entitled ‘American Postcards’.

In the book, the trio from the UK, Sweden and Ireland respectively present a series of photographs taken between 2004 – 2005 documenting their experiences and impressions of post 9/11 USA.

The images are accompanied by the annotated thoughts and written findings of photographers whilst in the US, all in picture-postcard format. Also featured are exclusive writing by Peter D. Osborne, author of ‘Travelling Light, travel and visual culture’.

The book, authored by Ronan who graduated from LCC in 2006, is available for digital download as well as for sale via Blurb at – http://www.blurb.com/books/3154411

Meet Fred, the whimsical new musical shredder developed by a team of BA Interaction and Moving Image students from the London College of Communication (LCC).

The team of second and third year students, Rafael Filomeno, Kate Pincott and Young Kim are aiming to bring joy to the workplace with a project they developed as part of an ‘Arduino Hack day’ held by ad agency Iris Worldwide back in February.

Briefed to ‘Make SXSW Smile’, participating teams were challenged to hack an everyday object, gadget or device in an original and innovative way to amuse and excite visitors to the Interactive and Film Festival SXSW (South By South West) in Texas. Those taking part were asked to add some element of interactivity to their chosen object using an ‘Arduino’ – an electronic board that can sense the environment around and use data from its sensors to affect its surroundings – and thus the sartorially named ‘Fred the Shredder’ was born.

And now for the science part…

Choosing a paper shedder as their inspiration, the team from LCC added their Arduino board to the inside of the shredder’s engine along with some light sensors that read the colours and patterns shown on the paper fed in. This is then transformed into data and converted into sounds. Furthermore, with the Arduino it’s also possible to transmit data to a network, allowing the students to transform the data picked up by the sensors into social media posts and tweets.

The LCC students’ winning idea and prototype was recently taken by Iris to SXSW  (http://sxsw.com/) where they presented the ideas as the main subject of their talk at this year’s event.

London College of Communication (LCC) Letterpress technician Alexander Cooper will be joining leading voices within the world of design at an event to be held at the Design Museum, Shad Thames, entitled ‘Graphic Design & Great Expectations’ on Friday 11 May.

The event will centre on how typography and layout affect the understanding of literary text, in an evening of discussion, presentations and workshops.

All those participating collaborated with GraphicDesign& on their first book, Page 1, a comparative typographic experiment that generated 70 designs of the first page of Dickens’ novel Great Expectations.

Alongside Alexander on the night will also be:

Phil Baines, Tony Brook of Spin, Jeremy Coysten of North, Paulus M. Dreibholz of Atelier Dreibholz, Paul Finn of Fitzroy and Finn, Alexander’s Workshop colleague Rose Gridneff, Marcus Leis Allion, Fraser Muggeridge of Fraser Muggeridge studio, Catherine Nippe, Ian Noble, Sam Piyasena (aka Billie Jean) and David Sudlow.

Date: Friday 11 May 2012
Time: 7.30pm
Location: Design Museum
Cost: £15 / £7.50 members
Booking: http://www.ticketweb.co.uk/user/?region=gb_london&query=detail&event=504794&interface=designmuseum

London College of Communication (LCC) BA Media & Cultural Studies course director Steve Cross’ co-authored article ‘Celebrity and Schadenfreude: The Cultural Politics of Fame in Free Fall’ has been included in Routledge’s ‘What’s Trending in Media and Cultural Studies’ – marking it out one of the most significant articles published in the last couple of years within this field of study.

The term ‘Schadenfreude’ describes the emotion of delight expressed through the witnessing of celebrity downfall, with Steven’s article questioning to what extent this can be understood within the wider context of economic inequality.

For those interested in Media & Cultural Studies, the article is a must and can be downloaded in full at: http://tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/09502381003750344