FABRICATING ART
EDITORIAL
PROFESSIONAL
Laurindo is a self-taught Brazilian artist and illustrator hailing from Belo Horizonte, born in 1980. He has lived and worked in France since 2003. Before starting his career as an illustrator, he worked as a designer in architecture and design studios in Paris. All those years working in these areas has provided Laurindo with a very disciplined take on the creative process and taught him how to apply these rules to his collage work. Laurindo works and collaborates with clients such as The Financial Times, Nestlé, Publicis Mojo Australia, Flaunt, Les Inrockuptibles, Revue XXI, Editora Abril, La Blogothèque among many others.
Laurindo has had the chance to work for Flaunt Magazine several times. Jim Turner, the art director behind the publication, “is one of the most talented professionals” Laurindo has ever met which is exactly why the Fabrication Issue was more than a simple commission. Jim was genuinely interested in understanding Laurindo’s work process and sent him a series of questions in order to try to find out more about what was on the mind of a collage/digital painter artist. The answers were made into an article. The illustrations have lead Laurindo to reflect on his own vision of fabricating collage.
laurindofeliciano.com
BRIEF:The entire issue was dedicated to Fabrication. I proposed to illustrate the creative process in fashion and art by using old images but in a contemporary setting.
MATERIALS: I usually use old papers to create backgrounds, textures and filters. Pencils, acrylic and a Pentax camera help me to create my own brushes. I find images in vintage magazines and books. Then, I use a scanner and Adobe Photoshop.
RESEARCH: I spent some hours researching images and drawing sketches. For the composition structure, I was looking for old pictures and videos of artists and fashion designers working in their studios. I found wonderful documents about Miro, Le Corbusier and Yves Saint Laurent.
PROCESS: I mixed old photos and scientific images. All the images were selected, scanned, cropped out in Photoshop and turned into black and white. This process is really important to me, because by doing so, I am able to use my own color palettes. I love creating my own brushes, I can always add new textures and use digital painting techniques to transform the elements of an image. I also included my own filters to homogenise all the images in a vintage flair.
RESISTANCES: I never suffer from the « blank page » complex because when I do self-initiated projects they are always based on texts. Due to my background in architecture and product design, I need to find aesthetic solutions for problems, coming up with answers to specific questions. The fact that I had complete freedom was the hardest part in the creative process. A great, deep research helped me to find the best way to do that.
INSIGHT: I had two weeks to create these artworks. It may have been the first time in my career that I had complete freedom to work. I started by answering the interview questions. It really helped me to find my place in this project and a way to think about my own fabricating process.
DISTRACTIONS: I must confess that it was hard to stop researching. I love seeing artists who inspire me working and I can spend weeks trying to understand their creative process. However, I had other ongoing projects and I couldn’t spend a lot of time on this phase of the project.
NUMBERS: Uncountable compliments from fans and friends on these illustrations. It became one of my highlights and this award proves it.
AFTERWORDS: My mum was a self-taught fashion designer exactly as I am a self-taught illustrator. When I saw the printed version of magazine, I realized that the main subconscious inspiration behind this was the hues in Fashion magazines that I saw throughout my childhood.