Being rained on during a summer picnic. A young woman of colour staring down an angry fascist. Union Jacks by the thousands on the Last Night of the Proms.
Whatever it means to be British in 2017, creatives are invited to share their visions with a chance to win £5,000 – and have their work seen by John Lydon, the iconic figure behind the Sex Pistols and Public Image Ltd.
Saxoprint ProStudio has devised the competition as a challenge for people to express their unique view of contemporary life in Great Britain, with entries submitted in the form of a traditional postcard, uploaded online.
Phil Foster, senior key account manager at Saxoprint UK, said: "We want creatives to sum up what Britain means to them, using a simple postcard format – the original ‘social media’. From the faded glamour of seaside towns to the hustle and bustle of city crowds, from woodland beauty and suburban prosaicness to village greens and slot machines, this is Britain in 2017."
This nationwide competition offers all creative minds, no matter what their professional background, the chance to showcase their talents and gain widespread exposure, as well as winning the £5,000 cash prize. Entries can be photographs, graphics, art works or any other visual format, as long as they fit the postcard form. They will be uploaded on the new Saxoprint ProStudio platform (see box below).
John Lydon heads the jury of expert judges from the worlds of art, design and business. They will look at all the submissions and draw up the shortlist of finalists.
All finalists will see their entries exhibited at a well-known London gallery and receive an invitation to the awards ceremony on Saturday 23 September 2017, where they can rub shoulders with other alternative thinkers and famous names from the UK design industry.
The public is also invited to vote for the submissions they like the most on the competition website.
"Postcards are great things to send and receive," said Lydon. "A good one captures an atmosphere, emotion or culture, while a bad one can captivate with hilarious awfulness. They are a good, cheap and cheerful way of communicating in an excellent form."
Also on the jury are Saxoprint CEO Daniel Ackermann; Dr Nicky Ryan, dean of design at London College of Communication, University of the Arts London; Neil Lovell, CEO of The Printing Charity; and Simon Biltcliffe, CEO of Webmart.
Upload your entries to: prostudio.saxoprint.co.uk/the-great-british-postcard-competition
Deadline: 31 July 2017
Virtual meeting place puts designers in touch with new clients
A new platform has been launched to help small- to medium-sized businesses with no graphics departments of their own to get in touch with design agencies and freelancers easily and quickly.Saxoprint ProStudio is a free initiative by online printing specialists Saxoprint.
The platform allows companies looking to create their own marketing materials to fill out a profile, upload a brief and then find the best designer for the job.
The idea for the platform came about after Saxoprint found that many of their clients asked for design recommendations to get their projects up to scratch before they were ready to print.
Designers can upload examples of their work and control their workload by updating their status to indicate availability. Clients are able to search using criteria such as the designers’ location or areas of expertise.
To avoid lengthy pitches, Saxoprint ProStudio only allows briefs to go to a maximum of three designers."We are offering the creative industry a contemporary communication platform with Saxoprint ProStudio," the company’s CEO, Daniel Ackermann, said. "Here, creative minds and small businesses can profit equally from each other. True to our philosophy of adding a human touch to online printing, we value and pride ourselves on user-friendliness and transparency."
Drew Selman, a Saxoprint ProStudio user, said: "Most of my clients were acquired through word of mouth. What’s great about ProStudio is that it’s a similar premise – it is still essentially a referral system, but the difference is that I don’t have to do all the networking;I can wait for the emails to come in."