Freddie Guthrie (he/him)
My practice revolves around language and play. I enjoy the tensions that are created by treating humorous concepts with total sincerity—I don’t feel that an object needs to be taken seriously in order to be beautiful, but I do think that the object should take itself seriously to some extent. Words are integral to my work; for me, a project isn’t complete unless the copy holds up with the visuals. I often come up with the writing at the same time as the design, which massively informs my process.
Too Many Chefs
Fictional hotshot design studio GuthShaw were approached by CHEF, a sentient AI cookery writer, to design and print The Cookbook You Don’t Have To Open: the first cookbook written entirely by AI. What began as an exploration into the ramifications of following rules set by AI quickly devolved into a farcical narrative, highlighting the tensions of the client-designer relationship. Collaborative project with Callum Kershaw.
News Agents
Undercover is a newspaper for spies to read while trailing their suspect. Inspired by the camp portrayal of spies in popular media, particularly during the 1960s, I wanted to create an object that was totally unaware of its position in the world in order to highlight the humour of fictional espionage. The centrefold is a removable sheet of camo, which plays on the cartoon idea of perfect and immediate camouflage.
I Heard One Calling
For this project I designed a sheet music edition for a composition by my friend John Moore—a setting of the 17th-century poem The Collar by George Herbert. The design is inspired by 17th-century sheet music and typesetting; the main typeface used is Signifier by Klim Type Foundry, which is based on Fell Types from around the same time. The composition explores heterophony, where multiple voices sing the same melody but deviate slightly at certain points, and that is mimicked in the overlapping deboss and screenprint on the cover.
Flash Sheet (exhibition identity)
Identity design for the Communication Design Y4 work in progress show. We wanted to avoid the design feeling stuffy and boring (which we felt was a misconception about Com Des), instead aiming to highlight the personality of the course and the fun of experimentation. We decided on the theme of temporary tattoos as a way of looking at the ephemeral nature of a WIP show compared to the permanence of degree show.
Facebook Gospel
Facebook Gospel looks at the way the boomer generation often treat Facebook ‘as gospel’ and the role reversal of being told not to trust what you read on the internet, by elevating Minions memes to the level of biblical ephemera. The project draws on the visual language of religious tracts to convey the innocence and joy of these seemingly banal memes. We made the poster at a large scale in the caseroom, before reproducing and redistributing it in public as an A5 pamphlet, in keeping with the idea of reposting on social media. Collaborative project with Molly Hooper.
