Artist Archives ⋆ Page 3 of 3 ⋆ Louise KirbyLouise Kirby

I was lucky to be selected to take part in the coaching with Cultural Enterprise Office with Lynn O’Neill. I really enjoyed the bespoke personal service and allowing myself the time to develop. I was encourage to think BIG, so I wanted to showcase my patterned artworks on a product that would dispel the myth that my artwork was only for scarves. So I started an self initiated project, for my all time favourite car the Land Rover Defender.

I think the brand really matched the essence of what I’m about and my love of the great outdoors. I wanted to use my patterned artwork and signature style of delicious colours, patterns, and expressive mark making with a rhythmic flow capturing the essence wilderness of the landscape to create sophisticated, natural and beautiful designs suitable for Land Rover Defender.

land rover section by louise kirby

So I set about creating some hand painted paper designs using imagery of the landscape, fields of pattern and animals. My visualisation was that I see the Land Rover Defenders as something that can go anywhere with no obstacle and I wanted to capture this in my artworks by merging and blending a variety of terrains into one another to give the feeling that Land Rovers can go anywhere, with spontaneous marks the emphasise the thrill, and adventure of the Land Rover Experience through the rugged British countryside.

I could imagine my patterned artworks on – exterior bodywork, spare wheel covers, interior upholstery, promotional leaflets, collectable toys, and water bottles to hoods.

From there I needed to visualise the artwork on a product, so without getting my hands on the real thing I tried putting my designs on simple line drawings. Here are some of my samples.

I searched for the biggest model I could afford and got this lovely toy and set about applying my design idea on the product. I also made a hand printed silk wheel cover too! I loved the little model so took it to the park to do a wee photo shoot. Here are some of the photos from that day.

I hope you like my creation; do you imagine driving about with my design on it?

I’d love to go on an adventure with Land Rover where I bring the creativity and they bring the wheels!

wheel commission louise kirby web

I entered the Art Category for the British Airways Great Britons competition to design the exterior surfaces of their aeroplanes – it was the ideal opportunity to showcase my work on 12 BA aeroplanes flying around the world. It couldn’t get any better!

[Thanks to Cara Pirie who helped me with my film clip]

The competition linked to the 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games; and I created a design especially for it as I thought my style would capture the excitement and drama of the Olympics!

After submitting 3 images (as above), a 2 minute film and 500 words, I was so excited to be shortlisted and to be in the final 10! I received a giant posted parcel, with lots of exciting goodies from BA – a model plane, colour swatches and profile drawings and CD of BA planes, interview guidelines. I loved the glossy swatches of paint!

The shortlist selection was held in the Royal Academy of Arts in London; where I had to give a 10 minute presentation and interview in front of a very high-profile panel – Tracey Emin (artist), Eliza Bonham Carter (Curator of Royal Academy), Luiza Fernandez (British Airways), David Barnes (British Airways). You can image how nerve racking that was! And to top it off there was a film crew and I had to be miked up!

Here’s me sitting waiting patiently! Portfolio – check! artwork – check! power point – check! nerves – check! Psychological pee – check!

I wanted to engage the panel to visualise my work in 3D, so I got them to make a paper aeroplane and fly them as part of my presentation. I was a bit apprehensive about asking them to do it but they were up for the challenge! Here are the planes made by the panel – they only had 30 seconds!

I got to meet some of the other shortlisted artists as we sat nervously waiting – Andrew David Green, Jayne Stephen, Martin Herbert.

Congratulations to Pascal Anson who won, this will really showcase his work to an international audience.

I’m very proud to have been shortlisted to the final 10 but obviously a wee bit disappointed not to be the winner! It was good experience and it’s all part of my mission to see my artwork on different contexts.

For the full British Airways press release click here.

Louise Kirby

creative process and projects of Louise Kirby

Tag Archives: Artist

Lets go on a journey together…

Shortlisted in British Airways Great Britons!