My visit to Holden and Sons confirmed what I heard at Textbook, and what I already suspected: My future lies in the world of images. Peter expressed surprise that my tutors hadn't transferted me to the Illustration course whether I wanted it or not.
Holden and Sons has expanded since our visit in the spring, so now there were roomy couches for me to sprawl on while Peter made the coffee. The new room isn't yet cluttered with old machinery, but if the other room is anything to go by I'll bet it soon will be.
Peter liked my images a lot, especially the linocuts. He reckons I've really got something there. He also liked a style of thinking that can jump from a Russian doll to a Dalek. What he doesn't like are my typographic skills, or their absence.
The 'leaves' print for the Growing Together project drew fire for the way the type has been highlighted to stand out from the 'busy' background.
I explained that I came up with the idea, created the image, and only then thought about how to merge in the type.
We fell to discussing an interest in typography, or a lack of it in my case. Peter's interest was sparked by this:
Adobe reared its ugly head when Peter said that today's studios expect full–spectrum skills from their potential recruits. I replied that I was never going to be better than average in that department, but that I didn't see myself touting for a studio position – who's going to take on a 55 year old? He then revealed that he knew perfectly good, experienced designers who couldn't get work as they were competing with the whole world now. Another suspicion confirmed – unless your skill is unique, someone on the other side of the world will undercut you. So my hopes of sitting in a room with bikes hanging off the wall, staring at a Mac screen, motionless but for my cursor hand, for eleven hours a day have been dashed.
So, self-employed printmaker it is. At least I'll be doing something I enjoy. How many workers can say that?
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