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Archie Fitzgerald

Off Design

©Siân Lynwen

Welcome to the first issue of 21grams! For those of you who don't know,21grams is thought to be the weight of the soul which inspired this issueand theme, "the weird and the wonderful ". We have looked into the ideasof death (Archie), life (Emily), identity (Emir), the soul (Marina), the heart(Colour Swatches), our mind (Synchrodogs), our lust (pillow talk), ourlove (trends) and our passion (Alex) through the beautiful art andphotography. We hope to give these lesser known artists the credit theydeserve and inspire you all to become a bit more creative too!

During this issue we have listened to:Nirvana, The Pixies, Gotye, Baroness,Lykke Li, Florence and The Machine, The Kinks.

During this issue we have watched:Fight Club, The Virgin Suicides, Running with Scissors,Red State, Coraline, Spirited Away.

Flick through the pages of the weird, the odd, the distorted, and the altered.

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Content

Danielle Greenhalgh

Page Six | Archie Fitzgerald

Page Twelve | Danielle Greenhalgh

Page Eighteen | Emir Šehanović

Page Twenty-Four | Colour Swatches

Page Thirty | Budget Shopping Drama

Page Thirty-Two | Alex Brunet

Page Thirty-Nine | Marina Refur

Page Forty-Five | Fun vs Funny

Page Forty-Seven | Synchrodogs

Page Fifty-Six | Feeling Cross

Page Fifty-Seven | Moon Trip

Page Fifty-Eight | Fantastic Florals

Page Fifty-Nine | Emily Rose Parris

Page Sixty-Three | Claire Huish

Page Sixty-Seven | Pillow Talk

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Alex Brunet

Emir Šehanović

Archie Fitzgerald

Danielle Greenhalgh

Marina Refur

Synchrodogs

6 Archie Fitzgerald

Archie is originallyfrom Canterbury inKent, currently in histhird year studyingillustration at UWE.The inspiration ofhis work comes from"the negative thingsin life; hate,suffering and death,the surreal, horrorfilms, the dark arts,murderers, weirdo'sand our bullshit,mind numbingauthoritarianconsumer society ",which we foundreally intriguing,different, andunusual.

He states that "hate andfrustration fuels most of my

work and this all comes fromthe world around me; the dead

eyed humans that fill our streetsand the advertising and media that confuses and controls

most of our population. I spend most of my time eitherdrawing, partying, reading or listening to hardcore and

noise." We are very happy to find an artist that is braveenough to step into the world of the unknown and send a

message with their work.

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Danielle Greenhalgh

Danielle is currently in her final year at LeedsMetropolitan studying Graphic Arts and Design who

hopes to teach and become a freelance illustrator afteruniversity. Her inspiration comes from books and films,observation of animals and humans, and patterns. We

love her style of illustration with collage.

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Emir Šehanović"I enjoy making art of things I found in myenvironment - virtual or real"

We love the mash up feeling of old and new with Emir's work. The nostalgic feelingmixed with the thought of a strange future is something that keeps us guessing.

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What is it with deep thoughts being written on colour charts? Why colourcharts? Why deep thoughts? Whatever the reason is, we love it! Let's all get

our feelings out. Maybe it will stop us all being emotional wrecks. Well,maybe just a tiny bit less anyway. So, here is a small selection of our

favourites and a few of our own thrown in.

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BUDGET SHOPPING DRAMAthis shit simply wouldn’t go down in M&S

I have recently come to the conclusion that a lot that is crude and tactless oreven base in conversation is usually forgiven if it is in some way amusing.With this in mind I will tell you a story which despite all other shortcomingsI found a little bit funny, and perhaps you will too. So we begin.

Being a student and living off a pittance I have found a way of treatingpoverty as not only manageable but fun, namely through the one-playergame, ‘The £20 Food Challenge’. The glossy title says it all so I won’telaborate beyond the fact that it means I eat far too many tinned tomatoes andspend far too much time cruising the aisles of a certain budget supermarket.And I have an iron deficiency. A few weeks ago, during yet another round ofThe Challenge, something unusual happened. A middle aged man (cheap pin-stripped suit, balding) pushed in front of me in the queue. I say unusual notbecause of the man’s appearance but because he pushed in front of me. In aqueue. In England. I stood back to see where this sacrilege would lead.

“Who’s in charge around here? I want to talk to whoever’s in charge!”

“Well the manager’s on a break, but perhaps there’s something I could helpyou with?”

“Well perhaps there is! Perhaps you could tell me how you people get awaywith calling these,” brandishes ripped reusable bag, “bags for life when theydon’t even last the bloody pissing walk home!”“I’m sorry to hear that…”

“I’m sure you are sorry, but that doesn’t change the fact that my shopping isnow spread all over Malden Road and that you … Denise – you and yourestablishment have wasted £23.70 of my money and 2 hours of my time withyour eco-warrior sham!”

“Look there’s not need to get upset…”

“I am not upset, I am simply expressing the perfectly reasonable opinion thatwhen I spend money on something that is otherwise free, on the sole pretextthat it is guaranteed for life I expect it to be more than just a useless bit ofplastic with watermelons printed on it. I don’t even like fuckingwatermelons!”

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ps. My housemate has just insisted that I let you know that that definitely wasnot a true story. Just so you can smile without feeling guilty.

And here the man reeled off a stream of profanities too colourful to repeat,even on a blog. As in all these situations I started off by being amused by itall, but then felt a growing sense of embarrassment for this pin-stripped manand his unreasonable anger. I guess its a sign of our humanity that we feeluncomfortable on other people’s behalf, but we quickly realise its limitationswhen we fail to intervene in such scenarios.

The whole episode had lasted a good ten minutes so far and from my furtiveupward glances I could see that the man was getting progressively redder,and that a sheen of sweat had spread across his forehead.

“And they try to make you feel guilty about the fucking penguins drowningin the fucking South Pole…”

Maybe he just needed a cup of tea.

“but all it really is, is another way to bleed you dry, probably invented bysome yoghurt-weaving prat with a trust fund!”

Or to go on holidays. Perhaps Majorca?

“I say it to you now Denise and I’ll say it again, I will never…”

And then there was silence. The pin-striped man had keeled over from a heartattack and died. So it turns out it really had been a bag for life.

Elly Watson

"A crazy afternoonwith Sarah"

Alex BrunetJoy MaireSarah

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“My style –I’d only say that it’s

something raw,without any fake stuff,

I just like to share amoment with my

model and I. Let theemotion go.”

“My inspirationcomes from myemotion and myfeelings. If I’m in asad mood I’d preferto shoot somethingmore dark andstrong with strongattitude and strictposes. Or if it’s agreat day it's goingto be a funny andcrazy shoot.”

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“I have no limit,I just live to create”

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“The mostimportant futureproject in myheart at this timeis that I’mworking on abook or fanzineabout mypersonal work.”

Marina RefurAfter first seeing Marina Refur’s Work we fell in love with the self-taught

photographer. One of her particular projects intrigued us “The 365Project”, we asked Marina to explain the concept of this a bit further: “I

remember that day when I first saw someone doing a 365 project on flickrand I was absolutely hit by the idea of taking a picture each day for oneyear. I thought by challenging myself to take a picture every day and tokeep the creative flow going I’d rather improve my photographic skills

than when shooting infrequently. So it somehow was the beginning of myphotographic career and it’s interesting to look back to the first pictures

I’ve created for it and how my work has changed since that day. Now thatone and a half year has passed I still haven’t finished the project for

several reasons but it was totally worth it to give it a try.”

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I was talking to my friend the other day and she was trying to justify hernew boyfriend’s complete absence of a sense of humour by the fact that sheherself is not funny. I was mortified.“Of course you’re funny! Why would Ihang out with you if you weren’t funny?” “No baaaaaaaaaby (she’s Italian)

I’m fun, but I’m not funny.” And I realised she was right, she’s not aparticularly funny person. I mean she makes me laugh, her life in all its

soap opera glory is pure comic relief to my sensible English ways, but shecould never crack a joke.

This new distinction between ‘fun’ and ‘funny has left me with food forthought. Am I fun or funny? And which one would I rather be? The personI’d automatically describe as funny is my dad. Bald, suited and booted withhis work pass clipped to his front pocket he does not look like your averagechubby funster, but inside this forty-something year old engineer is a wit

drier than the Queen’s eyes at Diana’s funeral. An incident that alwayscomes to mind is when he dropped my Grandma off at church and cameback to the car looking mortified. We asked him what was wrong and hesaid: “It was horrible. They’ve turned Jesus into bread and are ripping him

up into little pieces and eating him!” Or another time when we were gettingto move again and I asked my dad if he was sad about leaving anyone

behind. He put his hand on my shoulder, looked over at my mum and said:“No darling, because my favourite person in the world is coming with

me…myself.” My father is not a very popular man.

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The funnest person I know however is probably my little brother. Thesunshine child of the family he glides past the rest of our sly

witticisms on a long board of non-chalance and effortless cool.While being both the youngest and best looking of the siblings madehim the butt of many a sarcastic remark and the testing ground for

our ‘dark’ sense of humour (we once told him that the ghost of a littleboy who’d recently died in the village was going to kill him because

he’d stepped on his grave) my brother has turned out to be agenuinely fun guy. At 15 he snowboards, gets into clubs for free,

knows his fair share of good youtube clips and drives his babe of agirlfriend around on his moped (we promptly shat all over that one

though by telling him it was similar to shagging a fat girl: fun to rideuntil your friends find out.)

But while my brother is the epitome of the high school cool kid, Idon’t know if I’d like to be him. Because being fun doesn’t naturallycommand a whole lot of respect, and it seems that while being ‘fun’

or ‘funny’ could be synonymous with being ‘clever’ or ‘kind’, it’s alsocomes pretty close to being liked or not, and being the former seems

fucking exhausting. As a German friend of mine once told me: “Idon’t have to smile at everybody, I’m not American.” May my

sarcasm keep me warm at night.

Elly Watson

synchrodogs

Ukraine based photographers, Tania Shcheglova and Roman Noven are a photographingcouple who make up Synchrodogs. You can instantly see their unique style once youview one of their images through their conceptual concepts, use of colours, intriguinglocations and their models fascinating poses. For two who accidentally got involved in

photography through getting their first cameras as a present, their work certainly doesn’thave an amateur feel. Synchrodogs describe their style as “free and lawless”, and that is

quite clear through their unconventional images that emphasise unusualness. Theirinspiration comes from the environment around, which you can see as they shoot such

great locations. When I asked them how they find such fantastic and exceptionallocations, they explained, “We have a motorbike we bought for $300, it helps us to reach

fabulous spots. We just trust our intuition”. With such a range of images, some almosteccentric, I wondered how they felt about their past projects, “The pictures we shoot mayexcite us only the moment we first see them after scanning the films, later we get used to

them and cannot recognise which are good and which are not.” Well we certainly canand hope that you enjoy their work as much as we do.

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feeling

cross

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Be cooler than Jesus and jointhe crucifix clothing trend! If youare going to grunge why not go

all out and border on thesatanic. Or play that cute

catholic girl with a rebelliousside. Religious or not, we have

faith in these pieces.

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Cosm

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Why not take escapism to theextreme? Maybe you can't afford aholiday this year, so why not dreamabout what is past the stars? These

items are more than a touch ofstardust.

Rose

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Neon

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Flor

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Blue

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Add some blossom to your wardrobewith these floral pieces. They make

you feel like summer ever if theweather isn't quite there.

fantasticflorals

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Emily Rose Parris

Emily Rose Parris has come far for somebody only in their first year atuniversity. The BA(Hons) student at Kingston Upon Thames tells us how she

has been interested in art all her life, “ I remember when I was a kid, I'd gettold off over and over again for staying up past my bedtime and being foundin my room colouring in my colouring books”. The unique style of her workthat she describes as “reckless” has been influenced by Andy Warhol’s self

portraits and William Eggleston’s ground breaking colour photography. Weare excited to see how far she comes after education and expect great things.

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“I enjoy the processes of photography, like hand printing my work.”

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Claire HuishFeminine, soft, beautiful, honest, melancholyand ethereal are just a few ways that ClaireHuish describes her style. The near graduatethat discovered photography at sixteen and hasnever looked back, hopes to eventually enjoy acareer as a successful fashion photographer.After just finishing five editorials and with moreto come, we have great hopes. Her digital mediais influenced by the history of art, paintings,films, literature, colour, and light. We lookforward to seeing her future work.

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Elly Watson

Before I begin I’d just like to point out that the following content does not come solely

from my own experiences. I’ve talked to people. I’ve awkwardly asked the questions.

After more than a few uncomfortable conversations, I’d now like to collate my

research, share my findings and hope that others will come out. Because society

needs to know the weird shit that we’ve heard while doing the deed.

“Wow, this is better than riding my bike!”

“How much do you think it is for a bag of tomatoes at Tesco’s?”

“Dead dog dead dog dead dog dead dog”

“Did you know Keira Knightley was in the first Star Wars film?”

"Man power!”

“Do you want to see my stamp collection?”

“The force of your love is impregnating my uterus”

“Hello Tetley! Hello Clive!” (talking to her pet terrapins in the tank by the bed)

“You know, sometimes I think I could kill a man.”

You’d think there would never be a worse time to speak freely but there you go. If

you’ve said something strange in the sack please feel free to contribute.

Alex Brunet