Two days ago I posted a message on my Twitter and some other channels about having a moment of fulfillment; since I’ve crossed off all but one of my ambitions from the list for 2011. That raised the question from a few people about what that one ambitions was that I didn’t achieve. I was actually quite surprised to see that of every ambition on that list the only one people asked me about was the one which I didn’t achieve. (I guess that’s also due to how I phrased the message.)
I figured the matter was worth a blog post. Now, I didn’t intend to make a list of the things I did in 2011 but since I’m writing this post anyway: I might as well add that too. I’ve written blog posts about pretty much all the highlights this year, so to make this one a little less tedious I’ll just refer to those posts.
But first, here’s that one ambition I didn’t achieve this year: my very own web store for prints and other stuff. Yeah, that one has been on the shelf for quite some time now. I’ve worked out a lot of ideas for this one already. I even designed most of the promo merch I’d add to a shipment already. You know, self-designed guitar plectrums/picks those kind of small goodies. A little extra “thank you for buying”. Anyway, because this is a rather intensive undertaking and because I still haven’t figured out what I want to do exactly with a few things: I’ve placed it on hold for now. But who knows, maybe I’ll make 2012 the year for that one.
Some highlights for me as a designer in 2011:
- February - Decided to go freelance
- April - Featured in Publish magazine and Advanced Photoshop
- April - Was a part of a local exposition, the first exhibition of my artwork
- June - Made a very inspirational trip to OFFF Barcelona 2011
- June - Was a part of the design show held at the amazing Weapons of Mass Creation Festival, another exhibit of my artwork
- November - Was asked to write an extensive case study for the GoMediaZine
- December - Collaboration artwork was a part of the Stattmarkt art event in Berlin
This year was one filled with great changes for me personally. Since I decided to go freelance back in February I’ve worked on a heap of awesome projects and I’m super stoked about that. Saying you want to do something is one thing, actually doing it and making it happen is another. Being able to say to myself that I did it, that I made it happen, well that’s just incredible and such a satisfactory. But I'm far from done, I'm just getting started.
I’ve also met a lot of incredible and inspirational people over the course of this year and I hope that’ll be no less in the year to come. Coming back to ambitions, well, like I said in the tweet yesterday: It’s time to raise the bar for 2012. I’ll obviously keep you posted through my blog and Facebook page. With this post I’m signing off for the year. I hope you all have a fantastic new year’s eve. A toast to 2012, that it may be another spectacular year!
Nederlands