If you have been following us for a while you’ll know that we have been hard at work compiling the first edition of Occasional Papers, our publication that aims to showcase practice-based art and design research here at Emily Carr.  If you’re anything like us we thought you’d love to see a sneak peek of a couple of the layouts that made the final cut.

Mindful Interactions: Kimia Gholami and Zahra Jalali

With gorgeous full page imagery set against beautifully set copy, we love the pop of blue that gives this layout a little extra dimension. A suitable response to a poetic research project.

The UNITE Project, Vannysha Chang & Malika Gill

Something we wanted to highlight in this short round-up was the diversity of submissions we received: from our relationship with the natural world and those who inhabit it, to the creation of a safe space from which to discuss the stigma that surrounds substance abuse. This variety in content was fascinating to read and led to some interesting conversations on how these topics are covered in print media. The UNITE Project, for example, is primarily based on a number of animated films and so the question became about how to represent these in a printed or digital form. You can see above how key stills were chosen to storyboard some of the main messages.

Cone Worms XR, Sunny Nestler

Another key example that got us talking about what the publication or creative space constitutes today is Sunny Nestler’s Cone Worms project, a fascinating project that aimed to investigate how extended realities can create virtual gallery spaces and studio spaces accessible to those creatives with chronic illness and/or disabilities. Our layout above highlights some of the connections between traditional page and VR space, producing some thought-provoking graphics. Interestingly, the author points out that although there had been challenges representing the work of XR spaces and their 3D outputs into a 2D output such as the page, the act of writing about the process required for this article helped them understand the challenge of having to simultaneously consider existing in the physical world and the possibility of these 3D worlds co-existing.  

So there we have a short round-up of just a select few articles that feature in our upcoming digital publication preview, you’ll be able to see all of the articles and click through to all the videos, mixed reality spaces once we go live – keep your eyes peeled this week to find out when this first edition goes to press (in a manner of speaking!) and when and where you can download it from. For us it’s been such a privilege to read the collection of works. From poetic responses to the environment, to full-on mixed reality works and the exciting challenge of representing these to their fullest in a publication, it has been incredible. Thank you again to all of the contributors, you know who you are.