#creativitywork

Stay committed, they need to rely on you

One of the tips Paul gave was that you had to love the art, which I found extremely important. If you don’t love what you do, then it’ll be difficult to motivate and continue to do your job. You may find it boring, not have the patience for it or constantly get frustrated at the results you get and when you have clients, you need to get the work done.

Portfolios don’t work for everyone

Whilst it is good to have a portfolio, don’t threat too much if it doesn’t work out for you. Every artist is different and some photographers don’t rely on their portfolio to get them work.

It’s not going to happen overnight

I feel like this can fall with any bit of work. You should never expect anything to happen overnight, and photography is no different. Just because you have, a phone or camera does not make you an expert photographer.

Winner has a plan, loser has an excuse

If you want to get somewhere, plan. There will be times where you have to think on the spot and go with what you have. Even in the end, if it doesn’t end up being successful or going the direction you hoped it would. As long as you tried and looked at all the possible outcomes, that’s good enough. What’s not is giving up and trying to make excuses for it

There’s a 1000 photographers out there, you have to make them want you

You have to stand out from the crowd and make them want you. One opportunity could be all you need to prove yourself.

Be bold 

This man has been doing photography for 20+ years, initially to fill time during his A levels and eventually become a professional freelance photographer. Though Paul generally takes pictures of a wide variety of UK acts and beyond; he’s mostly known for taking pictures of Hip Hop moguls, publishing his first set of images to the UK magazine, Hip-Hop Connection. With that being said, here is a list of Paul Hampartsoumian’s Top 5 Artists.

Busta Rhymes

Considered to be underrated by Mr. Hampartsoumian, the first entry in this list goes to Busta Rhymes. Some of Paul’s favourite pieces that he’s taken in his career (from Busta Bust jumping over him while he still had his locks to a moment involving Princess Diana) are situations involving the gigantic speed rapper. Additionally, from first hand experience taking photos of Busta Rhymes, Paul admires his stage presence and the energy he exudes, as well as alot of his back to back hits, from ‘Gotta All in Check’ to ‘Give Me Some More’ to ‘Make It Clap’ to the ‘Touch It Remix’ and the ‘Look At Me Now’ verse.

Jay-Z

From people that are mega fans of Hip-hop/rap and even to many that aren’t too fond of the genre, Jay-Z is known far and wide as on of the greatest artist hip hop has ever produced. Being a similar age him, Paul admires the fact that as Jay-Z progresses in his career, so to does his subject matter (something that most of his contemporaries rarely do), noting that the topics he mentions in 4:44 are vastly different from his Blueprint albums. To put icing on the cake, Paul got the chance to take photos of him and his wife at the Royal Albert Hall!

Lupe Fiasco

Despite being a comparatively newer artist to the other rappers on his list, Paul gravitates towards his conscious lyrics. His rhyme schemes and clever punchlines, compliments the social messages in his music.

Chuck D (from Public Enemy)

Similar to Lupe Fiasco, Paul likes that the Public Enemy front man had a social message within their music and likes the fact that they had something important to say. He does point out however that as a duo, Chuck D was the more serious one, while Flavor Flav had more levity and humour.

Gang Starr

by Afsar Uddin

The development of money

Using barter to trade goods and services: Before money was created, people used a system of barter to trade goods or services.

Using items with intrinsic value as payment: The limitation of barter led people to create systems where the local community used an item they all valued as a means of payment.

Using items that represent value as money: an important stage in the development of money, then, was changing from an intermediate item that had value in its own right (an intrinsic value) to an item that represented value but had no value its own.

Using paper notes as money: China developed the idea of paper banknotes around the seventh century CE. Merchants who traded high-value goods found it impractical to carry large quantities of copper coin. Instead they deposited the coins with a trusted person, who gave them written receipts stating how much was stored in their name. Rather than paying for goods with actual coins, merchants paid by passing the receipt for the coins to the  person selling the goods, who could claim the coins in storage.

Over time, people no longer claimed the coins from storage because buyers and sellers agreed that the banknotes represented the value of the coins and would accept the banknotes as payment, knowing they could use it to make payments of their own.

By Afsar Uddin

Shepard Fairey made a poster call hope with Obama.

Hope: Obama and the turning point

The artist’s fame reached its peak in 2008 when he created Hope, a four-colour print of the face of Barack Obama, during the now-president’s first race for the White House. The posters, affixed illegally in full respect of street art tradition, were captioned with the words “change” and “vote”. They remain the undisputed, albeit unofficial, symbol of Obama’s electoral campaign. The president himself wrote Fairey a letter to thank him for the creative support, and for encouraging citizens to believe they could participate in change.

These images, together with many other well-known works by Shepard Fairey, are on display in Bologna until the 28th of February. Entry is free and posters, some autographed by the artist, are on sale.

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The choice of putting “HOPE” on the poster seems to be because not only does it look nicer than a longer word that would be more squished, but also because the word goes well with the expression on Barack Obama’s face. His eyes and mouth convey the feeling that he is ready to lead the country to a better future and that he is confident about his plans.

I love football so much that I have decided to create something using Fairey’s idea. I support Chelsea and my favourite player is Hazard so I made a poster with Hazard using photoshop. I tried my best.