Creating eye-catching promo for Art Mag Osaka
Concept and ideation
Print design
Illustration
Social media
OSAKA, JAPAN
The client
Art Mag Osaka (2016-2018) was an independent urban art and entertainment magazine in Osaka, Japan. Published in English, the magazine promoted creative arts, performance, and dining around the city.
The goals
Create unique illustrations for the magazine and design posters and social media for events.
Posters and social media—Art Mag wanted to grow its music events and bring together readers and creatives to raise money for ongoing publishing and events. The club event posters stood out in the ad landscape of downtown Osaka with high contrast design, bombastic colour, and bold type treatments.
Illustration—The magazine also wanted to create memorable back covers to promote the magazine and send out calls for artist submissions—with competing magazines saturating Osaka, the front and back of the magazine needed to be visible at a distance. We used bold, colourful illustrations of food in "non-traditional" preparations, designed to be appealing and appalling.
POSTER AND SOCIAL MEDIA
90s Dance Night
This poster is an homage to the design theme of the iconic Trainspotting (1996). Photo poses, colours, and type match the movie, printed on a VHS tape sleeve. Text includes the "Choose life..." monologue from the opening of Trainspotting, rewritten with a club-focused message.
During Art Mag Osaka's two-year publishing run, throwback-themed events were popular in Osaka. Many clubs in entertainment areas, like Shinsaibashi and Amerikamura, hold weekly parties. Art Mag Osaka wanted to celebrate the 90s, a decade that produced stellar dance music.
POSTER AND SOCIAL MEDIA
80s Night
Selectors played mainstream 80s hits and underground classics on a massive sound system. The design inspiration for this poster came from The Spoons' influential new wave album, Talkback (1983), a cover with a pastiche-inspired composition that was truly 80s.
POSTER AND SOCIAL MEDIA
Neon Pantheon poster and social media
This party was illuminated by blacklight and propelled by house and techno sets. The event had glowing makeup stations, neon wall painting, and a photo booth for partygoers. This poster draws on early rave flyer design, with bold type, bright colours, and abstract backgrounds.
BACK COVER ILLUSTRATION
Artisinal Meats
Wholly repulsive and irreverent, Artisanal Meats features the Art Mag Osaka wordmark, sculpted in meat and related byproducts.
From left to right, in descending order: a block of SPAM, a chunk of olive loaf, a T-bone, two cocktail weiner halves with toothpicks, a slice of lunchmeat, and assorted bones.
All lettering and meat illustrations were completed separately in pencil and ink before being scanned, traced, and coloured in Adobe Illustrator. Includes additional compositing using folded paper textures, soiling, and staining, to recreate butcher paper.
BACK COVER ILLUSTRATION
Lick Your Art Craving
At the height of summer in Osaka, day or night, the weather stays consistently above 35 degrees Celsius/95 degrees Fahrenheit. Lick Your Art Craving is a call-to-action with a cheeky nod to the wilting summer heat, using otherwise refreshing ice cream treats as melting, repellent elements. The colours and lines are inspired by old ice cream display signage around convenience store freezers.
COLOURING PAGE ILLUSTRATION
Peanut Butter Burger
Inspired by the John Hodgman maxim: "Nostalgia is a toxic impulse." The composition features pop-culture detritus from the Eighties stacked in a “burger” arrangement. Reminiscent of the legendary, parodic Wacky Packages trading cards.
The burger is made of old seat cushions, an Atari video game controller with tangled cables, an issue of MAD Magazine, two unspooled VHS cassettes, and a polyester "puffy" jacket. Streams of melting peanut butter cascade and pool at the base.