A good friend of mine has been telling me to check out Chrissie Abbott for ages. He was right – Chrissie Abbott is cool. Her work is a trippy combination of illustration, design, rainbow colour combos and sometimes cats. She has produced work for people like Vans, famous pop-stars and 2K by Gingham t-shirts. Chrissie lives in London and keeps folk up to date with her work on her cloudsandmonsters blog.

One of the best memories I have of OFFSET2009 was having the honour to meet and spend time with Massimo and Lella Vignelli. So it was with great please to learn about his surprise birthday party thrown for him by friends and colleagues in NYC last week. A report and photos are on the NY Times website. What a gentleman he is, an incredibly elegant couple. Many happy returns Massimo!

Here is Massimo’s inspiring talk from OFFSET2009.

Wow, 2010…what a year!

Living and working in Ireland it would be easy to think that with all the focus (justified though it was) on our economic downturn, the EU/IMF bailout, incompetent politicans, rising unemployment, the return of emigration and the snow (Sweet Jesus, the snow!) that 2010 must rank as one of the worse years in living memory. But despite the wave after wave of negativity washing over us we still witnessed a focussed and inspiring creative scene throughout the year… Seriously, it was there once you looked for it.

From Irish animations’ Oscar success in March to the inspirational presentations at OFFSET in October and so much more in between, 2010 really was a bumper year creatively both here and abroad and across all disciplines.

With that in mind, we surveyed some of our favourite creatives and commentators on what they felt were the highlights of the past year. And what a line up…Adrian Shaughnessy, Alex Trochut, Anthony Burrill, BLAM, Chloe Early, Chris Haughton, Conor Harrington, Daniel Eatock, David O’Reilly, Emily Forgot, Gavin Lucas, Genevieve Gauckler, James Jarvis, M&E, Nate Williams, Oliver Jeffers and many, many more.

You can download the PDF (30MB) here or go read it online at ISSUU.

We hope this document will help redress the negativity and be a perfect tonic as we all look forward to making 2011 even better!

Let us know what you think, and share your thoughts in the comments!
Bren Byrne & Richard Seabrooke
The Small Print

Finally seeing James Jean and PJ Lynch’s presentations from OFFSET2009 online is like remembering you still have to go to visit a relative who always gives great Christmas presents. You wish you had got it earlier but at the same time you are delighted that you still have to look forward to it. Well maybe I’m stretching the analogy, either way the videos are online now so go watch and enjoy.

Link on OFFSET page.

With a much needed general election looming, people have the chance to rewrite their future as opposed to that assigned to us over the last few months. If you don’t agree with what you’re being sold or told at the moment, tell your representative, change your vote, hell, run yourself and change the country. One such group looking to focus attention is Upstart, a collective formed to push the importance of the arts to any potential future government. The viral above is the first step of their journey, to find out more click here.

Happy new year y’all! Great to be back in the studio, as Richard said, and very excited to be starting the new year full of hope and expectation…and I think I’ve found the perfect tune to soundtrack the beginning of 2011.

Bit late coming to this as it launched last year but the documentary The Pipe is showing in cinemas all this month and then on tv in February. A powerful, beautifully shot portrait of the locals fighting the production by Shell of a major gas pipeline through their picturesque land, this is sure to stir lots of emotions. I saw a short preview the other night and it boiled my blood how badly these people were treated by the gardai and also how let down they were by the government. Quite sickening actually. Make sure you see this!

Now in its second year, ISACON features a pretty incredible bunch of leading lights from Irish and international animation together tomorrow (Thursday) and Friday in Ballyfermot College of Further Education during the day and The Sugar Club (Thursday evening). A hugely ambitious event, make sure you get out and support it if you’ve even an inkling of interest, the more of these events that happen the better!

Happy New Year from all of us at The Small Print, hope you had a great break and are ready for the exciting things we’ve got planned over the next 12 months. First post of the year and we’re already looking back. Parts 2 & 3 of Boston.com’s 2010 news photo review are now online, and like the first installment, contain some incredible images for you to be wowed by. Expect lots of posts over the coming days as we start the year fuelled on turkey, ham, stuffing and wayyyyy too much booze!!

Click here for Part 1, here for Part 2, and here for Part 3.