Chutney Chorus update

Here's what's going on or coming up for Tanya:

1. Lead 2D design for the Natural History Museum show Sensational Butterflies, a live butterfly show held in the grounds of the museum. It runs from the end of March until mid-September 2017. 

2. Various projects for Museum of London. These include animated GIFs and print design to market talks and events, and teachers' packs for the education team. 

3. Working alongside Alice Graham (curator/project manager), she is working on Agatha Christie: A Life in Photographs. This is the third leg of the tour, showing at the National Museum of Wales in Cardiff from June 2017. 

p.s. We've added our 2017 New Year's greetings anime to our GIF page. Look out for the spinning rooster head and you've found it:

https://chutneychorus.com/gifs/

Deborah Tallentire

Sometimes a wonderful job comes along that means much more than design. This is one of them. Deborah Tallentire approached me to create her a new brand and I jumped at the chance. Deborah - Debs to her friends - is a tailor and costumier with an impressive set of skills and a client-base to match. I knew I'd get as much out of this project as I put in - I've gained both an fascinating insight into her world and a new buddy. 

Debs has always had a very clear idea of who she is – she coined her strapline while being interviewed for an apprenticeship at Angels the Costumiers. (Google them – they won an ‘outstanding contribution’ BAFTA this year). When Tim Angel asked why she wanted to work with them she said "because I want to put character into cloth". She carried this philosophy with her throughout her time there and it’s now at the core of her own business. 

During the initial design brief, I felt quite strongly that we needed a visual representation of ‘putting character into cloth’ and, keeping in mind her client-base, it had to have movement, dynamism and a suggestion of ‘theatre’ in the broadest sense of the word. After much drafting, I came up with a needle and pin dancing together to create the letter 'D' – the idea being that she can use the icon as a stand-alone device and still keep her name firmly in peoples’ minds.

We’ve completed the first stage which is the website, digital presence and the embroidered labels - the latter of which I got a real kick out of. Next is stationery and work-wear and, with her eyes firmly fixed on the future, there are plans for more as Debs expands her business, including branching out into stage-ready.com, an exciting new venture that will see her and her team out of the studio and on location. 

Take at look at her website - design and build by Gunpowder Studios:

www.deborahtallentire.co.uk

(post by Tanya)

Chutney Chorus update

What Tanya has been up to:

• Early in the year Tanya retouched/re-drew the lead image for the current temporary show at Horniman Museum and Gardens.
•  She's just finished a project for the Learning team at the Museum of London. The brief was to create designs and written guidelines for schools' activity packs. The resulting suite of resources can be pulled together by an artworker and adapted for any age and activity.
• She finally has an Instagram page! Her first post was an appliqué piece – her love of which has been revived while being dazzled/humbled by the needlework of our latest client Deborah Tallentire. 

instagram.com/tanya_a_cornish

What Mike has been up to:

• Mike is pitching an illustrative product range to a client - we've got our fingers crossed and will keep you updated if and when things take off.

What we've both been up to:

• Having committed to an open studio event in June, we're busy building, drawing, cutting and sticking.
• We realised we've built up quite a portfolio of animated GIFs but we've never made one for a client. If you're a client looking for a playful, stylish GIF, take a look at our work and get in touch:

http://chutneychorus.com/gifs/

Chutney Chorus news

Things are busy over at Chutney Chorus. My biggest current project is the upcoming photography show Agatha Christie: Unfinished Portrait. I'm the sole designer, doing the 2D/3D design and the marketing campaign. The BBC ran a little article on it - link below. I'll share more as we get nearer the opening date. 

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-33141205

See more on agathachristie.com

Agatha Christie: Unfinished Portrait
26 Aug – 6 Sept 2015
Bankside Gallery (next to Tate Modern)
11am – 6pm
Free entry

(post by Tanya)

Mike's Instagram

Just launched my Instagram illustration page. Enough words already! Look at the pictures:

http://instagram.com/mike_dipre/

(post by Mike)

Lincoln Castle Revealed

For the past year I’ve been working on the Lincoln Castle Revealed project under the design lead of Ralph Appelbaum Associates. It’s a huge project with a budget of £22 million, so along with the gallery redesigns there’s new build too, including a purpose-built vault to house an original copy of the Magna Carta. 

Lincoln Castle is not short on history ... William the Conqueror built the first castle on the Roman remains of a fort. During the civil war it saw the Royalists overwhelmed by the Parliamentarians – they rampaged through the city, finally billeting in the Cathedral along with their horses. There's a Georgian/Victorian prison too which used the fascinating 'separate system' where prisoners were isolated from one another. This may not sound unusual until you see the prison chapel ... each of the pews is a series of single seater wooden cells where the prisoners couldn't see over the partitions to their neighbours – their only view was forced upward to the pulpit. And then there's the Magna Carta too of course, which is 800 years old this year. 

As for my work, I’ve been swimming in retouching, artworking, sampling, proofing, typesetting, technical specs and elevations as well as project managing my work flow, liaising with researchers, architects, fabricators etc. I'm working on around 175 individual graphic pieces in a variety of materials (enamel, bronze, wood, scrim, slate, plaster) which range in size from A6 to 30 squ m. Alongside the usual design and artwork responsibilities, a large chunk of my role requires keeping in mind thousands of tiny unresolved details and pursuing each one to completion ... loose ends are not my friends. I’ll post more about my work and some shots once the site is open after April 1st. 

In the meantime, take a look at the video links below to get a taste of the project:

www.lincolnshire.gov.uk/lincoln-castle-revealed/100256.article

(post by Tanya)

Chutney Chorus update

Things are busy in the studio. Here's what's going on or coming up:

1. Horniman Community Engagement team: the ever-inventive Horniman Museum are running a series of anthropology workshops for South Londoners. They commissioned us to create a recruitment flyer and a series of 18 postcards each showing a choice item from their collection. The postcards are mailed to the participants over 6 weeks. The content of the postcards is a surprise so we'll share our designs once the project is complete.

2. I'm currently working on another Horniman Museum project, the new membership identity and campaign. This involves posters, membership cards, banners, window vinyls and the like … more once the scheme is launched.

3. In the pipeline: I'll be assisting RAA who are heading up a capital project for Lincoln Castle. Dates TBC. The castle was built by William the Conqueror in 11th century which will make for some very exciting content. 

Don't forget you can still see my work at the Imperial War Museum: Horrible Histories®, Spies exhibition. It opens from July 2013 – Jan 2014 then re-opens in July 2014 – Jan 2015. My original blog post below. 

http://www.chutneychoruscreative.com/blog/horrible-histories-spies-exhibition 

(post by Tanya)