Shetland College UHI students' success in book cover competition

Three Shetland College UHI art students were presented with prizes yesterday (Thursday 3 March) by John Blanche for their winning entries in a recent competition to design a book cover for his biographical work entitled 'From the Far Haaf to the Sma' Half'. 

John Blanche said: "My book describes the working lives of four generations of the family, beginning with Peter Blance who skippered fishing smacks in the Faroe and Iceland fisheries in the late 19th century.  Peter had a very colourful career and, like many people at that time, was even known to dabble in the trade of smuggling tobacco and brandy in order to make ends meet.  I also share the stories of Peter's son, grandson and, myself, his great grandson; we were all involved in the Scotch whisky industry."

The art students on the National Certificate in Art and Design course researched aspects of Shetland's history prompted by the book's content and worked their visual ideas up in a variety of drawing and painting media before developing finished artwork using computer design software.

The finished concepts were judged by Jonathan Wills, Mary Blance and Wendy Gear who, after much debate, selected Ailsa Chaff's book cover for the first prize of £350.00.

Art lecturer, Anne-Marie McDiarmid, who led the students in this project, commented: "All students worked tremendously hard to respond to a professional brief. 

"Ailsa has developed her talent for illustration while at the college and her design stood out as it captured the essence of the brief and content of the book.  Her cover would have visual impact on a book shelf, the design captures the essence of the text in an elegant way and it portrays its Shetland links."

Ailsa Chaff added: "I really want to be an illustrator when I graduate and winning this prize has been a great start to my career."

Christine Henry won the second prize of £200.00 for accomplished art work.  She said: "I'm delighted to win this prize for my art."

Hannah Hunter's image had vigour and energy and won the third prize of £100.00.

Head of the Creative Industries Section, Angela Hunt, added: "The students and their lecturer clearly enjoyed this opportunity to develop their skills through real work experience.  It has been especially relevant for the students to learn new graphic skills in response to John's writing and enthusiasm for Shetland history."

Further information:
For further information, please contact: Angela Hunt, tel 01595 771000, email Angela.Hunt@shetland.uhi.ac.uk or visit www.shetland.uhi.ac.uk
Or, Louise Rosie, Shaw Marketing and Design Ltd, tel 01595 692465, email louise.rosie@shaw-online.com or visit www.shaw-online.com