Toot toot! Time to meet February's fantastic Students of the Month...

So here they are, our top three students of this month – meet photographerJoe Earley, product designer HyunYoung Park and illustrator Cynthia Kittler. Out of all the entries this month (and there were a lot!) we really felt that these three had submitted not just something original and very high quality, but also projects that seemed advanced for their tender years. Our relaunched Student of The Month competition is kindly supporetd by Laurence King and the three winners will receive a book each as well as our undying love and respect.

Without further ado, let’s have a look at the projects that earned them the title of It’s Nice That’s Student of the Month…

Joe Earley — The Narrative

In Joe’s series of photographs he has, quite simply, captured something that could have quite easily gone completely unnoticed — the bottom corners of the walls at an art fair. “I found an instant attraction to the protruding gallery corners, and after taking the first photograph I then began to think about the possibilities of the refined lines rushing through a selection of images of the same nature.” More like abstract collages or paintings than photographs, Joe’s images are a charming peek at the way we knock-up temporary structures to become exhibition spaces and “create a new impossible and imperfect space.”

Joe is currently in his second year, studying photography contemporary practice at The University of Creative Arts, Rochester
www.joeearly.tumblr.com

HyunYoung Park — Bark Beetle

Have you ever seen such curious little objects? We haven’t. This magical little ceramics series is entitled Bark Beetle and is made up of ceramic containers with carved mahogany stoppers. Almost like miniature relics or souvenirs from ancient lands, these objects are actually designed to utilise materials that would more often than not be refused for production. “While transmitting the texture of pest eaten bark that normally is treated as failure quality of wood,” Hyung Young says, “the objects embrace reusable quality and make it useful somehow.”

HyunYoung Park is currently in her first year at Kingston University, studying product and furniture design
www.cargocollective.com/91young

Cynthia Kittler – Erfundene Wirklichkeit

There is something about Cynthia’s kind, quiet illustration really resonates with us here at It’s Nice That. To make such a beautiful, unobtrusive book with such care from the binding, to the illustration to the story itself, is rather remarkable. Cynthia took texts by psychologist and philosopher Paul Watzlawick and transformed them into something much easier to digest in these symbolic, frank illustrations and silkscreen prints that illustrate “the construction of reality”.

Cynthia is currently in her fifth year at the Offenbach University of Art and is the co-founder of Parallel Universe Collective, a group of illustrators from Mainz, Hamburg and Berlin.
www.cynthiakittler.com

Student of the Month is kindly supported by Laurence King Publishing. You can sign up to the LKP Student List now to get 35% off all our student titles at www.laurenceking.com.