Bo Matteini, 365 Days

January 5 - February 16, 2024

One Grand Gallery is pleased to announce Three Hundred and Sixty Five Days by UK-based designer and artist Another Department (Bo Matteini). Matteini’s debut exhibition with the gallery is a culmination of a year’s worth of creative exercises. Born of a pandemic lockdown in 2022, the project began as a personal challenge giving attention to the melding of graphic design and personal passions and creating a unique design for each day of the year. Over the course of 12 months, 8,760 hours, 525,600 minutes, and 31,525,600 seconds Three Hundred and Sixty Five Days took the form of a deeper mindset rooted in repetition and experimentation. Ultimately, this practice revealed an immense capacity to grow, change, and develop when tasking oneself to create with such diligent intensity.

Matteini’s online presence, Another Department, was created as a vessel to house this creative idea—a space to make and post for the sake of sharing. In our digitally heavy world, the artist shares that expectation can often lead to fear and procrastination. Fortunately for Matteini, Three Hundred and Sixty Five Days’s steady routine of idea generation and implementation fostered a motivation to continue pursuing his self-appointed goal. Early designs such as “Day 20: Slow Down” and “Day 29: Ungodly Women” are a heavily collaged melangé of typeface, archival images, and calls to action. The text is bold and commanding and the colorways bright and grainy. These works make for perfectly capturing the attention of even the fast-paced rate of social media consumption. As Matteini continued refining his style and source ideas, later works take on a particular stylized aesthetic. As in “Day 189: You Are Going To Die” and “Day 326: We Are All We’ve Got” viewers can note the similarities shared with earlier designs while appreciating a turn towards sharper composition and simplified themes. For the artist, inspiration is culled from both the profound and the mundane—movies, music, artists, books and even one’s own notes app. Like a well-oiled design factory, the works on display for this exhibition show the full range of Matteini’s crafted technique. And now that this project is over, he asks, “Where do I go from here?”

Bo Matteini is a Designer and Artist from London UK. Another Department was started by Matteini in April 2022 as a 365 project. A melting pot of vintage ephemera, graphic design, sarcastic affirmations and cliche. His graphic work is led by experimentation, thematic links, composition and colour theory. His design is also greatly inspired by DIY punk posters, nostalgia and vintage design. Matteini studied at Camberwell College of Art with a degree in Illustration. He is currently the Art Director and Designer at UK brand SCRT and is taking freelance clients.

Press:

The Oregonian
Cliff Notes: Oregon Picks on Variable West


@another.dept
anotherdept.com

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