BAS MANTEL [REV. Laboratories]

Sleeve Design for Philippe Petit & Friends - A Scent Of Garmambrosia

Artist: Philippe Petit & Friends | Title: A Scent Of Garmambrosia | Label: Aagoo Records | Graphic Design: Bas Mantel | Street Date: 06/21/10

Due to the long distance-triangle between Marseille/Petit, Amsterdam/Mantel and New Jersey/Dartley (Aagoo), our collaboration for the sleeve artwork took place through communication by e-mail. To set our minds in the same creative direction we discussed a few inspiring album visuals we all like. At that time Philippe Petit envisioned it as a trilogy and thus wanted a design that would be recognizable on all of the sleeves, forming a suite. The Swans record sleeves came to mind with their brilliant designs that are easily recognizable in a record store.

We also spoke about old Blue Note Records with their beautiful black and white photo imagery and carefully selected Pantone colors and Green Grant’s sleeve Street of Dreams in particular.

Philippe liked the graphic design I did for the DVD label Reel23, which looks modern and elegant. He especially liked the ones I did for David Cronenberg’s movie Stereo & Crimes of the Future and Jonathan Weiss’s The Atrocity Exhibition. With these references in mind, I started to work.

The music of A Scent of Garmambrosia could be described as movements of masses of sound in haunted atmospheres; like sound images in close up with addictive stop-motion harmonic effects. The sleeve artwork is bound up with the general concept to visualize ‘the movement of masses of sound.’

The graphic interpretation/translation shows detailed parts of the vascular transportation system of the human body. The focus was on three parts of the system, skillfully collaged and mapped as scientific x-ray compositions in Pantone color 5415C-blue. The brain, the heart and the eye are the parts that became the blood vessel landscape for the inverted-birds or, ghost birds. They are the transmitters in the system, analogues to ‘the movement of masses of sound.’

Important in my work aesthetic is the cut-and-paste technique—scissors and glue with the help of a black & white Xerox copy machine. This technique allows me to edit, mix and arrange found materials into raw and original graphic compositions; which are palpable on a certain level and ‘similar’ to Philippe Petit’s work aesthetic in creating compositions of sound.

-BM-

More information;

http://www.aagoo.com

http://www.myspace.com/philippepetit