A year long personal project aimed at creating a visual narrative about the current landscape of art and design arranged by theme and color. The brand began as a collaged stream of consciousness meant to index imagery, inspiration, and current cultural movements. As it has progressed, it has extended from a website and instagram page into the beginnings of a tiny multidisciplanary design studio offering creative direction, graphic design, or branding. Starting as the use of found imagery to create a point of view on what is worth paying attention to; into custom work for clients and a platform to promote personal work and ideas. All of these projects embed a collaged form of visual communication and use the proximity, contrast and embedded narratives of images to tell stories about design movements, artists, or moments in time.
Pulling inspiration from everywhere, whether thats the internet, a formal masters education, or the song I am listening to that day all of these are equally as inspiring sometimes in the exact opposite way, and sometimes in the same. These moments of overlapping inspiration is what I hope to represent with 1-800. One collage can relate Le Corbusier, to skate culture, to Mobb Deep, to unreleased nikes and start to form its own narrative about what all of these things have in common or the differences in them. These somewhat siloed creative fields are not often discussed in unison, as the connections between them are not always clear. The intention of indexing imagery and inspiration is to offer a new narrative which combines the highest of “High Brow” art forms and the lowest simultaneously.The purpose and usage of the website is broken into three parts: 1. to Inspire via the Feed page, 2. to Index via the Directory page, and 3. to Share via Shop & Instagram pages.
Pulling inspiration from everywhere, whether thats the internet, a formal masters education, or the song I am listening to that day all of these are equally as inspiring sometimes in the exact opposite way, and sometimes in the same. These moments of overlapping inspiration is what I hope to represent with 1-800. One collage can relate Le Corbusier, to skate culture, to Mobb Deep, to unreleased nikes and start to form its own narrative about what all of these things have in common or the differences in them. These somewhat siloed creative fields are not often discussed in unison, as the connections between them are not always clear. The intention of indexing imagery and inspiration is to offer a new narrative which combines the highest of “High Brow” art forms and the lowest simultaneously.The purpose and usage of the website is broken into three parts: 1. to Inspire via the Feed page, 2. to Index via the Directory page, and 3. to Share via Shop & Instagram pages.
01 - The Feed
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This page works as an infinite scroll through collaged representations of art, culture, architecture, design and historical references. These images and topics come together under one theme whether that be aesthetic, lifestyle, or a political movement. Again combining similar ideas and contrasting ones. For example Cy Twombly paintings over 1960s scans of Outdoors magazines, with 90s rave flyers is the exact intention of 1-800* - to recontextualize the narrative about what each of these things represent seperately and ask what they may mean together.
Collaging
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(Click Through Images 01 - 12)
01 - Website Feed
For example this is an excerpt from the “Lives Left to Live” chapter. These compositions tell this story of defining the lives we believe we still have to live in our point of view on the topic and create narratives/comparisons/contrasts by overlappign images or placing them in close proximity. Exploring other topics like “time”, “mapping of the self,” “5YR Plan,” and “Distortion” represented through indexing and overlapping the most impactful found works in each of these categories. Each image is placed intentionally to communicate an idea/thought/point of view. These ideas can be understood as one image, one collage, or a whole scrollable section. Extending this idea on a micro and macro level across the websit. These can be clear and interpreted directly or less so and understood abstractly - it is ultimately up the viewer to derive meaning.
02 - Directory
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The Directory page directly isolates each image used in the collaging of each theme or direction. This page more directly indexes the exact images and lists where they are from, who created them, and what year they are from. The idea being that after seeing the collage if one wanted to dive more directly into the pieces that created that collage, the directory page would allow this. Again broken down by theme the intention is that artworks, images, or objects of all kinds flood each category to establish a new set of influences on what one may expect the inspiration around a movement of Architecture or Graphic Design might be.
The Directory page directly isolates each image used in the collaging of each theme or direction. This page more directly indexes the exact images and lists where they are from, who created them, and what year they are from. The idea being that after seeing the collage if one wanted to dive more directly into the pieces that created that collage, the directory page would allow this. Again broken down by theme the intention is that artworks, images, or objects of all kinds flood each category to establish a new set of influences on what one may expect the inspiration around a movement of Architecture or Graphic Design might be.
03 - Shop
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(Click Through Images 01 - 03)
The shop is a platform to create & sell products based off of our point of view on topics found in both the feed and directory page. The “services” side of the site furthers that point of view by allowing us to engage in creative work around these same topics and questions. It is also hugely helpful in extending our network and connecting us to designers and artists around the world.
Additional Imagery
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Through the digital + design platforms 1-800* aims to both index the cultural zeitgeist and then contribute to it through the services arm. The turning point for the blog is when it becomes not only the work of others but 1-800 also contributes its own work to these categories and themes. An extensive library of personal artwork created for 1-800 is interwoven into the feeds in order to create an outlet for ideas, objects, or designs I have created. Through this a mini-design firm emerged and continues to create work inspired by certain movements or themes. Clients for these works range from doing art direction for a luxury bespoke fashion house in Munich called Julius Abendroth, creating a fashion magazine with leading fashion expert and influencer Samutaro, and creating the new branding, album artwork, and album roll-out for Ross from Friends. Founding the services arm aims to eventually establish a multidisciplinary creative studio that offers creative direction, graphic and product design, architecture, and photography. Aiming to create the most “visual” visual communication and share this point of view through client and artists relationships. Our process is focused on research, concepting, iterative design and multidisciplanary collaboration.
(Click Through Images 01 - 03)
The shop is a platform to create & sell products based off of our point of view on topics found in both the feed and directory page. The “services” side of the site furthers that point of view by allowing us to engage in creative work around these same topics and questions. It is also hugely helpful in extending our network and connecting us to designers and artists around the world.
Additional Imagery
Through the digital + design platforms 1-800* aims to both index the cultural zeitgeist and then contribute to it through the services arm. The turning point for the blog is when it becomes not only the work of others but 1-800 also contributes its own work to these categories and themes. An extensive library of personal artwork created for 1-800 is interwoven into the feeds in order to create an outlet for ideas, objects, or designs I have created. Through this a mini-design firm emerged and continues to create work inspired by certain movements or themes. Clients for these works range from doing art direction for a luxury bespoke fashion house in Munich called Julius Abendroth, creating a fashion magazine with leading fashion expert and influencer Samutaro, and creating the new branding, album artwork, and album roll-out for Ross from Friends. Founding the services arm aims to eventually establish a multidisciplinary creative studio that offers creative direction, graphic and product design, architecture, and photography. Aiming to create the most “visual” visual communication and share this point of view through client and artists relationships. Our process is focused on research, concepting, iterative design and multidisciplanary collaboration.
MATTHEW AVALLONE
PORTFOLIO
©2021
©2021