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How Graphic Design Changed the Way I Approach My Canvas …!
Being a traditional artist alongside my world of creativity through graphic design in my business here at Virtually Untangled, is in a way just splattering colors and shapes all over the canvas for a simple yet very pleasing way to create whatever comes to mind. Yet my graphic design world is similar to my painter side of self in such a way that they are both creative expressions. Just in different forms.
However, along the way both creative styles have influenced one another. So, from a simple design system with standard procedures and series of steps to my paintbrush. Which is honestly very uncommon in our world today … Either one is a traditional artist (of many forms, not just with a paintbrush) or a designer (graphic and/or web). But somehow, I managed to become passionate and IN LOVE with both!
Art evokes the mystery without which the world would not exist. ~ Rene Magritte, Surrealist Artist
It all started back when I was taking a graphic design course in my younger than now years … We needed to take not only graphic design classes but also traditional art which included a series of nude studies and a background in mediums. And one of the very first things our art instructor told us was that by the end of our two-year program, we’d find (and master) our creative art style. And not only that but we needed to find a medium that expressed our interests and talents. To challenge what we were told (beat to our own path rather than walk someone else’s) and to not get intoxicated by process or fall in love with tools.
And all this was relevant to not only traditional art, but graphic design too!
Design in the absence of content is not design, it’s decoration. ~ Jeffrey Zeldman, Designer and Co-founder of Happy Cog
Now, usually artists and graphic designers work in two very different fields. Art is all about expressiveness and self-guidance, while graphic design is all about functionality for commercial purposes.
Finding my style in graphic design felt easy to me as I knew what I liked. That crisp edged vector artwork style filled with colour of a blast of just black and white to pack a punch. But when it came to my traditional art style, I struggled. It’s not that I couldn’t draw or paint. It was that I loved so many mediums which all worked quite differently from one another that I couldn’t find my style and make it meld through each of those mediums. To me, each medium I chose to work with held its own style. And for that I struggled, and my grades (in the art portion of the program) suffered.
I was quite unhappy through the artistic portion of this graphic design program. And I certainly did not understand why we needed ONE STYLE to call our own. And to this day, I still don’t have just one. However, through years of practice and the thoughtfulness I place into every graphic design (and website) project I do … I FOUND MY STYLE!
And, not only that but I have come to recognize the importance of maintaining working knowledge of the compliments of both areas of passion. And whether digital or traditional, branding is crucial for any creative entrepreneur. Many artists are designers, and many designers are artists. But very few artists and designers are one in the same at the same time. I am living proof!
So, to end things off on a fun note – and so that you can better get to know both creative sides of my life of creativity, here’s some samples of my traditional artistic style that took me oh so many years to grow and perfect …
Plus, here’s a very quick sneak peek on ONE of the projects I’m working on right now …
Limitations live only in our minds. But if we use our imaginations, our possibilities become limitless.
~ Jamie Paolinetti, Artistic Director of The Atwater Playhouse
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Crystal Kordalchuk
Crystal is an artist, a writer, an organizer, a dreamer, a doer, and down-right proud of it NERD!.
Struck with a love for #AllThings creative at a very young age, Crystal dreamed of a life fueled by her passion for creating and bringing the stories and images in her mind into reality.
As she worked toward her dreams, she earned a diploma as a Computer Applications Specialist then another in Graphic Design and from there began to develop her extensive background in multimedia and the arts. She began her worked in the magazine industry as a layout designer and had a succession of design jobs thereafter. It was her role as a graphic/web designer that gave her the first real glimpse of her future. Soon she began a side job as a freelance designer while keeping one foot in the corporate world. A spark was lit! She turned her freelance gig into a full-time business combining design work with her other passion: creating organization from virtual chaos.
Crystal is one of the most organized individuals on the planet. She is by all means a Zen master of her crafts. She excels at helping others become “untangled” and provides her clients with tools to run their businesses smoothly while she takes care of the details behind the scenes. Thus Virtually Untangled was born. A successful business where her work as a top notch creative in graphic and web — with a twist of virtual assistant — married into one amazing place where clients can come with their virtual messes and become magically untangled. Crystal can always make sense of even the most unorganized chaos and offers a virtual detox of order and peace, so her clients can get busy doing the work that they love the most.
