Portfolio Visits Part 2

Fig Taylor

 The first visit I had with the new contents of my portfolio was from Fig Taylor, a portfolio consultant who previously gave the class a presentation with advice about how to be successful in self-promotion. We sat round as a group and she looked through each of our portfolios to give us feedback and to tell us where our territory of work would lie in the industry. She got to mine and had a glance through. She mentioned that my work acquired minimalistic elements and that she wasn't too sure where to categorize it in illustration. I found this both disheartening and positive, because my work clearly has potential in other fields of the industry. It was critical feedback, so I'll use it to my advantage.

Day Job

 When we had our London trip, we visited an illustrator collective called Day Job. They're 10 postgraduates who make work in a empty mill-type environment, and produce zines together for promotional value. I enjoyed the experience of being there and hope to eventually work in a similar space. After we had a group discussion, we each showed them our portfolios one by one to receive feedback. I introduced myself to two of the girls by the names of Grace and Victoria and let them have a look through my portfolio. I gave a brief insight into what most of my work is about, saying that I like to create visual responses from themes within narratives. I told them of my worries too with my work not appearing to obtain a particular context and just being a random assortment of images. Also that the abstraction in my work leads it away from being considered illustration. They responded positively stating that it's always up to the artist who produces the work, and it's all down to personal interpretation. They were both complimentary of what I showed them too saying that it's interesting to see something abstracted for once. This left me feeling a lot more confident about my work because I had previous doubts of whether I should even attempt going into the illustration industry. I told them it was the best feedback I'd received.

Ben Jones

 The most recent review of my portfolio came from Ben Jones, who graduated at Stockport. He helped out in first year and reviewed my work at the end of second. He encouraged me to work more hand-rendered as opposed to using the computer, and it's proven very successful as you can see in The Outsider project. I sent him an email asking if he could give me some feedback on my updated portfolio. He said yes and gave good criticism. He said the technique I picked up from The Outsider project has proven successful in both style and context. He admires my raw perspective and said I should perhaps start to work on canvas on a big scale. This is similar feedback I've had before two other people who said my work could be seen as fine art.