Gerard Saint Creative Director

INSIDE KNOWLEDGE

Gerard Saint, Creative Director, Big Active.

What did you want to be when you grew up?

Lead singer in my band.

What was the first record you bought?

45rpm – Stranglers ‘Peaches’

33rpm – Sex Pistols ‘Never Mind The Bollocks’

What was your first big career break?

When I discovered music though listening to John Peel as a kid.

What has been your career path up til now?

I founded Big Active with design friends after leaving art college and I’ve been running with that ever since. On the journey we’ve art directed and designed everything from album covers to fashion magazines to photography books to brand identities to pretty much every aspect of graphic design really I guess. And along the way we’ve worked hard and played hard and created some work that I’m really proud of. That’s what it’s all about really.

What does your job involve?

A creative director’s job is to oversee the bigger picture – directing the creative output by driving the wider vision of individual projects that we are working on. It also involves commissioning and directing other image makers – photographers and illustrators for instance who may want to collaborate with to bring a project to life. As a studio we are a very close team so I suppose it’s like being the lead singer of the band.

What is your average day?

Artists, bands and record labels come to us to create imagery to package the way their act and music is presented – it’s all about creating individual identities – and as every act is different so too every project is unique – so I guess there’s no such thing as the average day.

What is the best thing about your job?

Having the opportunity to collaborate and work with some of the the best creative people in the world.

What is the worst thing about your job?

Dealing with new artists who might be under the illusion that they’ve just reinvented the wheel. 

What are the main qualities needed to be an art director?

Ideas and an open mind, a sense of vision and the ability to keep focused on the bigger picture.

Which artists/projects have been the most fun to work with, and why?

Every project we work on is different, that’s what makes our job so interesting. As a studio we’ve worked with lots of great artists recently including White Lies, The Enemy, Athlete, Keane, Snowpatrol, Subways, Muse, Goldfrapp and Basement Jaxx – so having a really diverse range of clients always keeps things pretty fresh. 

What to date is your proudest achievement in work?

We won a D&AD Yellow Pencil for our work on ‘The Information’ by Beck a couple of years ago – which was great as it’s an album package that I’m really proud of. Beck was a brilliant artist to work with and we wanted to create a sleeve that brought the listener closer to the spirit in which the music was recorded encouraging them to really engage in the creative experience. Our idea was to create a DIY album cover for fans to design or customize themselves by using sheets of individual stickers by many different image makers whose work we commissioned and curated for the project. We then simply created a blank cover for fans to fill in. That way the packaging format itself could personalized and as a result no two albums might ever look the same. This was encouraged further by setting up an online forum for fans to upload and share their work. We hoped to create a much wider story by bringing into question the whole idea of making a physical album package at a time when more and more people are simply downloading music digitally. In this case you really had to own the physical album artifact to complete the experience.

What in your view is the future of your industry?

Good integrated music design is about creating the defining image which can work across many different platforms from physical packaging that you can touch and feel to new digital platforms that can interact with in alternative ways. Image will always be a requirement of selling music and now there’s so many more new ways to express that side of the creative process. The music industry model is really changing right now and in the next few years I think we’ll see some really innovative work being done.

How do you think your job will adapt in the future?

It will involve working with many different forms of media and mastering the cultural connections between them. In a way the ubiquitous CD format has long been the enemy of innovative music design – but now record labels are having to adapt to a wider fragmented market where music can be accessed in many different forms and I believe that’s going to be very liberating for designers.

What are your career ambitions?

To continue to create great work.

Top 5 Tips for aspiring music art directors/designers?

1. Obviously be passionate about the culture of music, design and image making.

2. Recognize that the music industry is changing and music design is no longer just about the album cover.

3. Remember every act and project is individual – and difference is what makes people sit up and take notice.

4. Always be ambitious about the bigger picture but ignoring the detail means you’re not really looking.

5. Never pitch ideas for free – be professional – your work has value.