I had a vision once. It was bleak. It had me laying awake at night. Those times in the morning around 4am when you’re wide awake – and all these ideas come into your brain. How to get away and make some creative money.

Well I had this thought 12 months ago, and Gordon Brown (at the time the UK’s Prime Minister) had my blood boiling. My wife, who is from Asia, actually stopped me from going onto the BBC website for a while to stop me from seeing his face – Going Down – as she called him. So at 4am I had an idea… to vent my frustration by creating artwork that channelled my anger into something positive. Great. And why not make a few bob by selling t-shirts with those images on? Sounded like a good idea, but unfortunately, my anti-Brown passion only stretched as far as myself and other freinds who laughed at the images, but failed to put their hand in their pocket. Oh, well.

The store I created at cafepress.com will soon be taken down. The result? TWO shirts sold. So while my plan came crashing down, there’s two people in the whole world in possession of probably the most exclusive piece of creative art, – second only to my Moist “Push” EP residing on my shelf.

Anyway… since the site will be down shortly, I’ve logged my favourite piece on here for posterity. The one where he looks like Ché but it actually reads – Che-rio. He’s gone now and we have a new PM so maybe the guy who bought only the one can put it on his wall in 10 year’s time.

Here’s to Gordon Brown – the EX-Prime Minister, and my attempt to use creative art (unsuccessfully) to be his downfall.

VANROOJ

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What is it to block out and re-create a specific message? Most redaction takes place subconsciously everyday by graphic designers all over the world. You know the way it is, a widow or orphan stuck at the top of the next column – or just a little too much description requiring a little snip. Remove a couple of words, keep the meaning the same.

Of course sometimes it can be to alter it’s original meaning. Remove the odd word – change the whole context. Probably the translation of the Bible falls into category. For me “Thou shalt not kill” is different to “Thou shalt not murder” Each, translator given a brief beforehand by the patron into the full purpose of the teachings.

However, redactional fatigue even in accident can give us an insight into the original context by studying different translations and the motives of each one – then working out the gap between each new translation. Why are certain words removed by one, yet included by another? I suppose in a way Redactional Fatigue – could be given a much simpler description, to dress it up in a different way.

I’ve been recently experimenting with redaction. To alter a meaning by simply blocking out a few words. Of course, when faced with a large amount of text – its easy to clip the odd word or phrase and change it the way you want. But the smaller the original message and the more direct – the harder to redact.

Cigarette packet warnings are pretty direct and the challenge was to manipulate the original message to give it a different perspective.

VANROOJ

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Then we add a template that we can work out later.

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Then we add a template that we can work out later.

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Then we add a template that we can work out later.

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Then we add a template that we can work out later.

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Then we add a template that we can work out later.

Here’s some commentary about the picture.
Then we add a template that we can work out later.