See Gail Bichler, Frith Kerr, Chris Ware & more at OFFSET 2018

Creative festival OFFSET returns to Dublin in March with three days of talks from designers, directors, artists and animators. Here’s a look at some of the highlights…

Since 2009 creative conference OFFSET has hosted talks by some of the biggest names and most exciting emerging talent in the creative industries. Previous speakers include prolific children’s book illustrator Tomi Ungerer, graphic design legend Seymour Chwast and graphic designer for TV and film Annie Atkins.

This year’s line-up promises another great mix of Irish and international creatives and talks spanning design, advertising, illustration, photography, art, animation and filmmaking.

Day one: Moving Brands, Aoife McArdle and Ivan Cash

Day one includes talks from Sean Murphy, Creative Director at Moving Brands, interactive artist and filmmaker Ivan Cash and writer, director and photographer Aoife Mcardle.

McArdle grew up in Northern Ireland and started out with directing collective Minivegas. She has directed ads for Audi and Absolut and created Toyota’s 2018 Superbowl film. She has just completed her first feature film Kissing Candice – a coming-of-age tale set in a seaside town on the border between Northern Ireland and the Republic.

Cash is based in San Francisco and makes short films and commercials. His ‘Last Photo’ project – an ongoing series where he records strangers showing him the last photo taken on their phone – has received over 1 million views online. He also created a short film on protest signs following demonstrations in the US last year and has directed ads for Toyota and Google.

 

Day two: Frith Kerr, Chris Ware, Simon Rocha & Gail Bichler

Day two kicks off with a talk from Pentagram partners Luke Powell and Jody Hudson-Powell, followed by Studio Frith founder Frith Kerr and cartoonist Chris Ware.

Kerr has designed books, campaigns and graphic identities for leading galleries, museums and creatives (Studio Frith’s client list includes fashion designer Hussein Chalayan as well as Frieze Art Fair and London’s Hayward Gallery).

Ware has created over 30 covers for the New Yorker magazine as well as the brilliant graphic novel Jimmy Corrigan: The Smartest Kid on Earth.

From Jimmy Corrigan: The Smartest Kid on Earth by Chris Ware
Studio Frith’s identity for London art festival Art Night

 

Also speaking is Gail Bichler – Design Director at the New York Times magazine – and Irish fashion designer Simone Rocha. Rocha graduated from Central Saint Martins in 2010 and received the British Fashion Award for Emerging Talent in 2013. Her designs are now stocked in Dover Street Market and Selfridges.

Spread from the New York Times magazine’s ’25 songs’ issue – a look at 25 songs that tell us “where music is going”

 

Day three: ustwo games, Joan Bergin and Nora Twomey

Day three kicks off with a talk from Dan Gray at ustwo games. Gray was executive producer on Monument Valley – the beautiful, Escher-inspired puzzle game that has been downloaded millions of times – and now heads up ustwo’s dedicated games studio. The studio released a successful follow-up to Monument Valley last year – you can read our feature on the making of it here – and created VR puzzle game Land’s End in 2015.

Also taking to the stage is Joan Bergin – a costume designer for TV and film with over 30 years experience – and Nora Twomey of Kilkenny animation studio Cartoon Salooon.

Bergin won four Emmy awards for her work on BBC series The Tudors. She also designed costumes for Canadian-Irish drama Vikings and worked with Daniel Day Lewis on courtroom drama In the Name of the Father and 1989 film My Left Foot.

Twomey recently directed The Breadwinner, an animated drama based on Deborah Ellis’s young adult novel of the same name. The film has received Golden Globe and Academy Award nominations and is due for release in the UK in May this year.

Other speakers on day three include designer and technologist Joshua Davis and Antar Walker – a designer and director at MPC who has worked on campaigns for Apple and Nike.

The conference takes place from March 23 to 25 at the Bord Gáis Energy Theatre.

One day tickets cost €50 for students and €95 for professionals. Weekend tickets are €115 for students, €145 for recent graduates and €225 for professionals (or €185 for professional groups of five or more).

See iloveoffset.com for more info or to buy tickets or follow @weloveoffset on Twitter for regular updates.