LEIF PODHAJSKY - RESEARCH

CREATIVE REPORT: Building on your continued familiarisation with the creative industries and prompted by the need for even more engagement with professional contacts, you are required to seek out an industry practitioner or practice who you will base a report on. The completed report should utilise your skills as both a creative and a researcher and make use of material drawn from at least one personal interview with an appropriate spokesperson to then culminate in an insightful overview of a contemporary industry figure or organisation. Your interview can be carried out in person or via phone, Skype or email. Supporting sessions will offer guidance regarding the approaching and interviewing of subjects You should aim to subsequently develop a report that is engaging in terms of both its style and content. The completed report should be submitted as a digital Issuu publication posted to your PPP blog and needs to communicate your interview subject's route into industry and identify where their creative practice is currently situated. LEIF PODHAJSKY Leif Podhajsky is an Australian graphic designer and art director well known for his distinctive album art working with artists such as Tame Impala, Young Magic etc. Podhajsky's work has been described as "striking abstractions of nature – mirrored vistas, engulfing waves, rippling, melting cosmic landscapes". Podhajsky has emerged as a promising photographer, with his brooding landscape photography attracting a large following through his popular Instagram and Facebook accounts. Podhajsky has worked with many different musical artists and, in addition to creating album art, has also created artwork for a number of record label around the world, such as Warp Records and Sony Music, with tour posters, T-shirts and other merchandise. Podhajsky has also worked with Australian psychedelic rock and Tame Impala on numerous occasions, creating art for their album Innersperaker and its follow-up Lonerism. Style: Podhajsky's work explores themes of connectedness, love, fear, magic, the relevance of nature and the psychedelic or altered experience, and uses techniques such as pattern, recursion, balance, symmetry and repetition. By utilizing these subjects he attempts to "coerce the viewer into a realignment with themselves and their surroundings".  Conceptually, Podhajsky believes "the concepts I explore are universal to all humans and I believe we have lost touch with a lot of these in our modern lives. We're all secretly searching for answers to true happiness and contentment." Work: Podhajsky's personal philosophy on working with musical artists is "I try and work with artists who I respect - whose music I would want to listen to. A lot of albums that have my work on them are on solid rotation. Ideally I like to spend a lot of time with the music working out a story and concept which I can capture the whole albums feel and flow." Podhajsky also uses album art to "create one image which encompasses an entire album of story and emotion". Music also inspires Podhajsky in "not just work for record labels or bands, but across everything I do. I find it helps me turn the part of my brain that over analyses and makes things logical switch off. This helps as it lets me form compositions in a more natural and fluid way, so it felt really organic to begin creating artwork for musicians. I have always loved album art and think it can really add to the whole experience of an album."