Aimee Grundell is a multi-skilled artist and practitioner, who specialises in a number of different design fields. Her talents lie in creating large installation pieces which are exhibited in a fun, interactive and often comical way. In showing us her work, she can take about any random object and turn it into something visually engaging and inventive.
Over the years, Aimee has mastered about every skill. I got the impression that she gains joy from doing a bit of everything. Aimee collaborates with lots of different designers, finding new ways to evolve her practice. In relation to my work this is something which I’d like to explore. Like Aimee, I want to be more experimental, by trying out new things. What I really liked about Aimee was her positive attitude towards design. More specifically, how she isn’t afraid to make mistakes and embark on new journey’s.
Through observing Aimee's work, I was particularly drawn towards one of her projects called ‘the nine ladies dancing’. This was an interactive, Christmas installation piece for children. Aimee spoke greatly about the challenges and lessons she's learnt from this project. Things don't always work perfectly the first time around. In fact, Aimee spent several weeks refining, improving and ironing out some of the issues with her original concept. Overall, the main lesson learnt here, was that sometimes we have to fail
in order for us to see the clearer picture. It’s about playing around with your practice and finding new solutions to reach your end goal. This is something which I’m gradually learning myself. In the past, failure was very difficult for me to accept. Over time, I’ve learnt that defeat only leads to growth and development of skills. Design would be boring if we got everything right first time around.
The nine dancing ladies installation - image from Aimee's presentation
Similar to the previous guest lecturers, Aimee’s design career hasn’t been a straight and easy journey. Her past experience has allowed her to meet and work alongside numerous individuals. As she believes this has been beneficial to her current role. As creatives it’s important that we surround ourselves with different people. It’s where we learn, gain skills and develop our main knowledge. When you get a job you can’t pick who you work with. Therefore it’s good to challenge and surround yourself with people who you don’t usually mix with. I’ve tried to practically apply this within my university modules. In my design, management and production course, I'm currently working with a group of individuals, who have mixed skills and abilities.
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