Youth today is more impressively talented and influential than ever. The resources provided by the Internet amongst a cornucopia of cultural influxes have enabled young people to broaden their intellectual horizons and hone new skills and abilities like never before. An ideal beneficiary of these modern-age perks is 21-year-old, Brighton-based graphic design student, Dan Mountford.
The stints of work experience he’s acquired are as diverse as they are impressive (The Economist, NewScientist and EMI Records to name a few), and despite his young age, he has already shown in Paris. Yet, after poring through a portfolio of clean and contemporary prints depicting a range of absorbing visuals including grayscale architecture and Buddhist statues, it’s impossible to argue with such obvious talent.
Much of Mountford’s strongest work is included within Double Exposure Portraits, a project, which involves fusing two images together, often creating striking juxtaposition within the final images. This is demonstrated most vividly in works such as The Butterfly Lion or Mind Over Matter. The washed out colour palette that ties these images together instills the project with an ethereal quality, which is humanized by the subject matter. Faces and headshots are often used to form the shapes and backdrops of the images, overlaid with wisping foliage or autumn-strewn paths.
Not confined to the realms of unmoving graphic stills, Mountford readily dabbles in photography and motion design, too. Since he is continually expanding and evolving his portfolio, Mountford’s is a space, which is worth watching.
