OFFF Festival Barcelona 2014

So after returning from Barcelona to see the OFF Festival i thought i would write a blog post sharing my experience from the trip and what i thought about it.

The event was split into 3 days, from Thursday to Saturday, starting at 11:30am and ending at 9:00pm. Each speaker was given a time slot of about an hour in one of two rooms. There was the Roots room where roughly 3,000 people could be seated and the Open Room where only about 300 people could be seated. Obviously the larger more popular speakers were presenting in the Roots room and where I saw all the speakers i wanted to.

The Roots Room

Personally before the event i had not heard or known of most of the speakers that had come to present their work however when they showed what they had created i had more than often come across their work and was just unaware who had created it. The first speaker i saw was Lorem Ipsum; They were a design studio that is made up of people from around the world and they were responsible for the look and feel of the entire event. They created promotional videos, posters and what the stage looked like.


After that I watched a Design Studio Called Polynoid. I liked the work they did, however what stuck out for me the most was what they were talking about when it came to working in this field. They talked about Client work and how the money was not great and how they were not happy with what they were doing. Overall it set a reality compared to other success stories where people would talk about how much they loved where they were at and how much they enjoyed their work.

Another speaker i saw was a Calligraphy and Font Design called Seb Lester. Seb Lester lives in Lewes which was quite a surprise to see someone that lives in the same area i study talking at this event and showing off their work. The work he had done involved creating a font called 'Neo Sans' and it went on to be used on products worldwide and even used for the Vancouver 2010 Winter Olympics on each Olympians uniform and the number they were. He even showed a picture of Arnold Schwarzenegger wearing a scarf at the Winter Olympics that had his Font on it which was pretty funny. After that he showed us his Calligraphy work which i found the most interesting part of his speech and one of the top highlights at the whole event. He would often write famous quotes in his Calligraphy style and also write some rather humorous notes that would involve swearing.

Seb Lester's advice he gives to most students

On the second day i watched a speaker called Oliver Jeffers. He is an picture book artist from Northern Island that creates books for mainly children. He has a unique style of art and his handwriting has become well known as he uses it in most of his books.

The Incredible Book Eating Boy

This is an example of some of his artwork for the book 'The Incredible Book Eating Boy' the story of a boy that believes if he eats books he will become smarter. Personally i really like the style of artwork and the stories that he creates. I remember him saying that he gets his inspiration from everywhere. "Everything starts from an idea, and ideas come from everywhere". When he gets an idea he will start sketching and writing everything down in his sketchbooks. I found this inspiring as using sketchbooks is a key aspect for this course and clearly a key aspect for him when creating his work.

Man exercising his need to impose order on the world

Another style of his artwork is that he has the ability to create incredibly realistic paintings as he very talented, however he will add a twist onto his work where he will add an element from his work on children's books on top of it as a form of vandalism. In the picture above you can see he's added a bright pink speech bubble that says "STAY!" in his classic cartoon style. I really like this style of art as i think it shows him thinking outside the box and the freedom he gives himself when creating. Nobody else would dare to do something like that on a piece of artwork except for him. It might decrease the overall value of the painting but i think it definitely adds something more onto it.

From the OFFF event i learned a lot from each speaker and i found it very inspiring and helpful for my work. It has taught me that i need to work a lot harder than i am if i want to get to where they are and i need to be more creative and not be afraid to try new things. "Curiosity is the key" is a quote that also stuck out for me personally from the event. I want to take everything i saw and learned from the event and apply it to my work in the hopes to do a lot better.