Art College: What's it worth? tells three different stories revolving around art college experiences and the lengths people will go to to attend art college.
My first story is the story of my father going to art school in Belfast during the Troubles, communicated through type design. I then look at NCAD and its history of protest, specifically the protests to reform the art college in 1969.
From these stories, I reflect on my own art college story, the communities of NCAD and the societies' apathy towards protest.
The crisis of NCAD 1969-71, publication, cover
The crisis of NCAD 1969-71, publication, page spread
The crisis of NCAD 1969-71, publication, page spread
DAD'81 is a unicase display typeface based on my Dad's handwriting while going to art school in Belfast 1981
My Dad, Séan went to attend art college in East Belfast, coming from the Catholic majority West Belfast means he had to hide his Irish-ness. He changed his name to John and hid his Catholic identity. While hiding his identity he changed his hand-writing to an Irish script. This is the inspiration for my typeface.
My Dad's memory box from art school
Experiment with laser cutting my Dad's handwriting into a red brick
My typeface in red brick
My typeface in use with a quote by Emmet Kirwan about Irish apathy