One of the biggest things I have learned from James over that year and half I have worked with him is… Pay attention. Most often a really great solution is right in front of you. This is a mess I found on my desk when I was cleaning up after a few jobs. Its a great poster. I loved the way it looked, so I took a photo. I’ll probably use it as reference for a future project.
James has a saying, “if you want attention, you have to pay attention”.
Enjoy!
We went to the MoMA yesterday for some much needed inspiration and to cash in some guest passes James gave me. We saw Picasso’s Guitars exibit which was fabulous, Warhol’s films, and of course the impressionists. My favorite paintings of this visit had to be Robert Motherwell’s work. Obviously a gifted artist, proportionally very nice, illogical in all the good ways, but what caught my attention was Western Air. If you look closely, you can see he painted it over another painting. Its reassuring to see, even the masters can be unhappy with their work and redo.
On the way out I wanted to stop and see if the MoMA bookstore had a book of John Stezaker’s work (currently my hero) and low and behold sitting between Banksy and Picasso was a book I designed with James Victore called LUST. In it a spread of my work I did for it. It was very encouraging to see it in such good company (the other completely awesome designers in the book and of course, Picasso and Banksy). I am very grateful and humbled—I will chase this feeling—today the bookstore, tomorrow the walls.
My niece Bailey’s birthday is this week, so I made her a little birthday package. I like to mark up things I find to make little notes for people.
We got up at 3am on Wednesday to head back to the motherland for a few weeks. It feels good to be away from the craziness of NYC. Here are a few snippets from the drive down.
© 2010 Chris Thompson and Leigh Anna Thompson, all rights reserved.