OFFICIAL MEDIA LAUNCH

Artbound is a non-profit organization that is striving to end the cycle of poverty through art initiatives. Founded in 2009 in support of Free the Children, Artbound builds schools dedicated to the arts in developing countries. Their mandate is to enrich and empower the students, and engage a global audience to take action through financial support or volunteer work. They also strive to raise greater awareness as to the plight of the children in these developing countries.

Derooted is excited to be working with Artbound to help get their message out and their initiatives noticed. They recently redesigned the organizations website with great success. The result is a site that’s easy to navigate, maintains their identity, and highlights the organizations mandate, and the importance of their work.

Derooted is also proudly sponsoring The Party – celebrating the power of the arts on September 24. For more information about Artbound and the Party visit artbound.ca

It is often a challenge for artists to make art for a living as well as find ways to continue creating, considering the economy and the current cultural cutbacks cultivating these artists is extremely important. This is a feeling that the members of InPrint Collective share; a sense that artists need to band together to create support groups to ensure the growth of the art community. There are so many personal, political and social commentary messages that are shared through art. It is such an important form of expression and community; it is therefore necessary to promote and nurture this movement.

InPrint Collective is a group of artists, writers and academics, with a deep love for printmaking, who strive to achieve these ideals through the development and growth of the printmaking community. The grassroots group is composed of four member artists: Anisia Avram, Maaike Bouhuijzen-Wenger, Maureen Da Silva and Noelle Wharton-Ayer, who share a deep passion for art and a love of printmaking. The group came together to form InPrint Collective on the onset of graduating from the York University Print Media program. Unsure of what was to come next for themselves the artists knew two things, they loved printmaking and they loved the studio space and community that came along with the University program. InPrint Collective came out of these as a means of developing and re-creating this studio experience and holding on to the artist bonds that had developed. This social aspect, of coming together as artists to discuss and encourage art-making, was one of the main forces driving these artists to develop the group. But most of all it was their love for art and print making that bound them together.

InPrint Collective currently runs out of Maureen’s home, but they are constantly growing and developing, with plans of opening their own studio as they do. The not-for-profit group is constantly on the look out for new artists to get involved with the group and their upcoming events. Their ultimate goal is to have a shared eco-friendly printmaking facility, as their love for the earth runs just as deep as their love for printmaking. InPrint has taken the route of event planning to heart and have held a number of events promoting printmaking as well as celebrating art including: a summer series of artist talks held at Alternative Grounds Coffee Shop, gallery shows, artist exhibitions (including York University print media students), talks and exhibitions with the InPrint Collective artists, a benefit concert as well as their highly successful Print or Treat Halloween event. These events work to exhibit and promote the work of artists and students and to raise awareness for the art form. These artist talks provide opportunities for artists and students to give illustrated talks that are based on their own research or in-studio work. All the events and work of the InPrint Collective help to support themselves and other emerging artists as they work to get out in the public. They desire to help promote and young artists as well as nurture artists work by developing a space for printmakers to practice as well as offer printmaking classes to spread the print love.

InPrint is an incredible grassroots group dedicated to keep printing and keep printing together who have paved their way along a challenging path. The group’s love for art and desire for growth have led them down the path to event planning to spread the word of the group and art. As mentioned earlier these events have worked to gain the support of the community and art lovers alike and generate an incredible buzz for the organization. This all came together recently with the help of Derooted Creative Agency, working hand in hand to develop the brand and spread the word through events and social media. This partnership began with Derooted helping to transform InPrint’s website to an easily accessible and navigated page that could be easily updated by the group members. This site improvement helped to put the group as well as their artwork into the public view and improve the groups social media reach. From here the development of a Twitter page came into play as well as linking everything together successfully to the Facebook page. Today social media is one of the most incredible ways for organizations to get personally involved and in touch with their members and it posed a perfect experience for the printmaking followers, lovers and members of InPrint.

The partnership did not stop with the online world, Derooted also worked to help develop and advertise the Print or Treat Print Halloween fundraiser. This was an incredible opportunity to let the creative juices flow as Derooted created a variety of unique ways to draw the public attention to the event. One of the most popular items were Trick or treat miniature treat bags that were placed around the city filled with candy to grab individuals attention and invite them to the event. This was an extremely successful fundraiser that not only raised awareness but also excitement and helped build relationships for InPrint with supporters and the community. Both sides have been very happy with the extremely positive results of the event as well as the social media and website transitions which is truly a testament to the success of this partnership. From here InPrint has continued to flourish and will continue to bring printmaking to the city and share their enthusiasm for the craft with everyone.

InPrint is constantly in the works for new events and workshops. They recently held their Stomping Grounds event that was an exhibition of InPrint Collectives ‘In Store Series’ to will provide emerging artists with the opportunity to exhibit their work and build ties with the community. In addition 30% of the art sales were donated to the Red Cross to help support their global aid efforts. If you have any questions about upcoming events, InPrint itself, or are interested in submitting work please visit InPrint’s website at http://inprintstudio.ca and join there Facebook page for the latest up to dates.

-Janine Lubey

Everyone has a calling, some for fashion, some for business, some for art, but whatever their calling the most important thing that they can do is to recognize it and grasp a hold of their opportunities to create a future they can be passionate about. The field of photography is one in which it is highly important for an individual to forge their own path and to create their own unique identity. Photography is an art that is spread across such a wide variety of businesses such as fashion, art, advertising, food, travel, interiors, products, people, and the list goes on. In forging their career path a photographer must discover in which field their path lies; they must discover their true passion.

Henrieta Haniskova is an artist who has truly worked to forge her own path in the photography industry. Her portfolio reflects her eye for capturing the true essence of an individual’s emotion and aura in the moment to truly present visual stories. Her work is underlined by an emotionally charged visual intrigue with a subtle sense of humor, presented in a contemporary way that appeals to and resonates with the viewer. It is unique in its style, approach and content and interacts with the viewer by presenting a moment, an emotion, an idea and a story. Her deep and quick connections and empathy for individuals is a blessing in her photography. It brings strength to her skills at connecting with her subjects in a way that truly shines through the lens.

Henrieta has truly forged her own path in the world of photography and seized all opportunities to build herself to the successful artist she is today. As a young girl in Socialist Czechoslovakia, Henrieta’s life was headed in a rather different path. She was raised in a small medieval town where her time was spent daydreaming and drawing. Growing up she set on the career path of nursing, a job that she loved for its contact with people and requirement to stay calm in the face of trauma. However, the career proved difficult for Henrieta because of her deep empathy for others. She found herself too young to handle the amount of pain and suffering nursing brought with it. A change came about in the face of the Velvet Revolution of 1989, Henrieta was offered the opportunity to forge a new life in Canada and she bravely seized it. This was an opportunity that would transform Henrieta’s life. As she recognized her passion for the arts and photography she dedicated her first paycheck in Canada on her first camera, an OM1 Olympus manual SLR. This was just the beginning of Henrieta’s journey as a photographer, but an experience that sparked her inner passion. As she began her journey Henrieta took photography classes at the Toronto School of Art, through which she was inspired by the program and the motivation of her teachers to go to photography school. Her passion led her to work hard several years in order to make this dream a reality, and finally managed to get to Ryerson as a part time student. From here her inspiration and drive grew as she assisted commercial photographers freelance to learn and mentor from these amazing photographers.

The field of photography is vast, with so many options for the aspiring artist. Faced with these opportunities, Henrieta embarked on a journey of discovery and learned to find her place and passion in the industry. Initially she had aspirations of fashion photography, but desired to try and learn all other styles and businesses. Initially her work brought her to be hired by a travel website for whom she would fly to far destinations documenting through photography and video for two years. This job was an incredibly eye opening experience as it led her to the realization that what was of true importance to her was meeting and connecting with people on the job. Her strength for connection and empathy with the individual emerged. She discovered that what she really loved was photographing people and capturing their lives. This realization has led Henrieta to develop a portfolio of portraits that truly represent her skills and ideas. She has since been shooting editorials and some advertising work as well as corporate portraits and is proud to have opened her first solo show as a featured artist of the Contact festival in Toronto with her Elvis Tribute Artists series. This body of work is much acclaimed and has won her third place in the International Photography Awards in New York as well as first place in this years Contact photography festival competition.

Henrieta is in love with the work she does and her passion continues to grow as she builds her portfolio, experiences the success of her Elvis Tribute series and continues to work on editorial, corporate and advertising photography projects. Her success in the Contact art show has lit a fire of motivation and inspiration for future projects. With this success comes the hope and drive to make fine art a big part of her career and business in the future, and it is quite clear from her competition successes and beautiful work that this is a calling that is meant to be.

As Henrieta works to build and expand her business and create a brand image for herself she has looked to her friends at derooted, as both have continued to work together in close collaboration. The relationship between Henrieta and derooted began as a close friendship but has successfully developed into close collaboration between the two. It has been an incredible friendship and creative relationship playing with creative ideas, inspiring each other, and helping each other out. Henrieta is a close collaborating photographer for derooted. You can see a number of her images throughout derooted’s client sites and branding. derooted has also worked to help Henrieta along the route of her growing business by helping her brand in an incredible way that captures her personality and style perfectly through developing her logo and website. The relationship has worked out to the benefit of both groups as Henrieta lends her incredible talent and derooted effectively offers solutions that perfectly understand the marketing landscape today in the most effective and creative ways.

To take a look at some of Henrieta’s brilliant work see her website at henrietahaniskova.com to find her online portfolio or to commission her.

- Janine Lubey

As a student of advertising, sometimes I am lucky enough to be given opportunities to attend advertising conferences to gain inspiration and incite from our industries leading visionaries. The other day I was lucky enough to be given the opportunity to attend Shift Disturbers, a conference that brings “a mash-up of visionaries to the stage, from the worlds of advertising, art and design for a half-day of inspirational words from the gods of creativity”. I was called up for the event about three hours before and had no idea what to expect, but it was clear from the moment I stepped up to the front doors of the St Lawrence Centre for the Arts, that this would not be an ordinary conference. Greeting every passerby at the entrance to the centre was a man in a wild suit wearing a sandwich board, who could more or less be summed up as a crazed, possibly homeless man ranting at passerby’s. At first we all tried to scurry away from him as quickly as possible, but at a closer inspection you realized that the sandwich board was in fact a poster for the conference we were about to attend. Now if that isn’t a mood setting entrance I don’t know what is!

I’m not going to lie, some of us were pretty confused by the man outside, but an explanation was soon presented in the form of an introduction video to open the conference. The video was a great introduction to the event; a chopped motion video that depicted the build up to the sandwich board man outside and how he came to be. Portrayed by Stefan Stagmeister, the man created a shrine of all the Shift Disturber speakers in his office space then continued to build his sandwich board sign and go outside to rant on the streets of Toronto. It was a great lead up to the event setting a quirky, pumped up tone and in turn giving a sort of introduction or credit roll for the speakers.

The day at the Shift Disturbers conference was definitely unique and was filled with very insightful and inspiring discussions and presentations. Unfortunately, the keynote speaker Stefan Stagmeister was unable to attend due to illness, a loss that was clearly felt throughout the audience through sighs of disappointment at the announcement. However, everyone’s spirits quickly picked up as Cindy Gallop took the stage. This is a woman who is clearly not afraid to speak her mind and is loud and proud to be herself. She discussed the 7 factors of where she believes the future of advertising is: goodness, transparency, action, agency, money, production and magic. Cindy did not shy away from any topic including where she believes advertising is heading, her ventures and even her love life. She focused on views of the new marketing reality and the developments and importance of social media. Advertising has turned away from being something people enjoy. Lately much advertising has relied on tricking audiences to pay attention, which in turn has developed a sense of bitterness. It is time for advertisers to return to creating advertising that is good, not just good ads. She emphasized the necessity of responding with complete honesty and integrity and the importance of real time responsiveness, providing the example of her website makelovenotporn.com as a commentary on the disillusions of men on sex in society. This founder and CEO of IfWeRanTheWorld.com is definitely not afraid to take a stance and is incredibly capturing and entertaining as a speaker. To get a taste of Cindy’s style check out her TED speech for makelovenotporn.com; especially take a look at the comments section to really see her personality.

Following Cindy Gallop’s entertaining speech was Stéphane Xiberras presenting BETC’s new invention, which I found intriguing and entertaining, yet frightening at the same time. This invention is C.A.I., Creative Artificial Intelligence, also known as Kay, a computerized machine with the ability to generate branding and advertisements according to categories you select. There has been a questionable notion developing around small businesses that spending big money for creative is not necessary. Thanks to do it yourself websites many think they can successfully brand and advertise on their own. Unfortunately, these groups do not recognize the fact that these will be un-unique misses that will not allow the brand to stand out but rather cheapen the image or fall back as bland or average. It is the creative minds that know how to develop a unique and successful brand. This machine brings about the frightening question, could a machine replace the creative role of an ad agency? Could C.A.I. be the future of advertising?

This machine was beginning to create a sense of anxiety in the audience, but Stéphane went on to explain that replacing the creative is not the purpose behind C.A.I. The machine has been developed as a sort of commentary on the faltering trust of society and a reflection of just how important unique, creative ideas are to brands and the fact that a computerized machine does not have the ability to creatively decipher concepts but rather develops basic, common layouts and bland, general ideas. Stéphane’s presentation was really fun and interactive as he let audience members choose the product categories to create our own ads. The program works by producing three advertisement options, some of which were hilariously extreme or incongruent, but then the unsettled hush would fall and awkward giggles arise as an acceptable, useable ad appeared. This presentation of C.A.I. left me with the unsettled question in the back of my mind; is the recognition of creativity dying out? Is it possible that in the future these machines could take over the industry creative jobs? Stéphane’s speech provided us with some hope, but I think it is definitely a wake up call to keep an eye out for technological substitutes and to kick up our game. As Cindy put it, to begin creating great advertising.

After a packed day the Shift Disturbers event came to a close with a final speech from Nick Law, the Chief Creative Officer of R/GA. Nick took a very different approach from the previous speakers of the day, focusing on the use of graphs to provide depictions of the relationships between factors in the creative cycle. He focused on the importance and distinctions of collaborative relationships across all disciplines. In our highly interactive and digitized world it is very important, in order for a campaign to be successful, to have a close collaboration between the traditional advertising and digital shops. In the reality of today it is necessary to bring all facets of visual design, copywriting and digital design together to work interactively to create successful campaigns on every front that bring the brand together as a whole. He emphasized the necessity of this collaboration describing that “no one knows it all”, using examples such as Nike’s SPARQ to illustrate the success of such collaborations.

At the completion of my day at Shift Disturbers I felt very fortunate to have been given the opportunity to attend such a unique event and to have heard from such inspiring advertising visionaries. I definitely feel inspired and motivated to go forth in the world of creativity and to fight back against the machines by using them to my advantage rather than vice versa. Through my experience here at Derooted Creative Agency I have really learned the importance and advantages of websites and social media in the development of a successful brand in connecting with your audience. Technology is the advertising future, but collaboration is one of the most important things that we can harness to successfully bring our creative and brands to life on all fronts, through all facets.

- Janine Lubey
derooted.com