Dazed Club Spotlight is our monthly series showcasing up-and-coming talent from the Dazed creative community. If you’d like to be featured, download the app HERE and join our community. You just have to post your best project(s) and the Dazed team will take a look – we select one person from the community to spotlight per week, which then end up in our monthly spotlight roundup.

JAYE INK

“I’m Jaye and I’m a Libyan/American multi-disciplinary artist currently studying at Central Saint Martins. I primarily work with digital processes, often integrating painting, sculpture, and photography in a practice best described as experimental, exploratory, and adaptable.

“This series is part of a project that combines my love of fashion and video games to create unique characters. I see both fields as multifaceted realms with endless scope for creativity and innovation. My introduction to video games started at five years old, when I was first gifted a Nintendo DS Lite and a bunch of different games. I loved browsing the character menus and, as a kid, I was enthralled by characters’ outfits, exaggerated proportions, quirky features, and eccentric mannerisms. I was further captivated when I discovered each character had their own lore and that I was exploring and navigating complex worlds. At such a young age, it definitely fuelled a lot of my imagination and profoundly shaped my creativity.

“In video game character design, every accessory and fashion choice serves as a conduit for outwardly expressing the character’s personality; from the style of their attire to the intricate details of their accessories – each element is carefully designed to communicate nuances of their persona. And fashion is no different. I collected fashion magazines during middle school and cut out my favourite looks to paste in scrapbooks, sometimes creating stories for them, and ripped out editorials to stick on my bedroom wall to admire.

“This project draws parallels between the theatrics and storytelling that exist within the world of fashion and game development, and seeks to evoke a distinctive viewpoint that hopefully will resonate with audiences. I’m currently working on more characters with the goal of creating a large character selection interface (just like in the video games). This project is still very much in its early stages, and I’m eager to develop it and watch it evolve into something truly impactful.”

@jaye.ink

jayeink.com

KATE PARTINGTON

"As a collage and visual artist, I create both physical and digital collage alongside video collage pieces and try to translate the analogue into the digital while also exploring how the two worlds can interact. My series focuses on ideas of touch and intimacy – I try to capture connections that we as humans develop so easily with one another. This particular series on desire is focused on capturing the beauty and joy of touch and the feelings that come about from these relationships.

“As a medium, I find collage constantly rooted in change, it’s a very transformative medium which appeals massively to me. I like the way collage appeals to something almost childlike within us, cutting things up and sticking them together to create and express. As a medium, collage can be very open and free, not necessarily restricted by other ‘rules’ of more traditional or formal means of art.

“My artistic series often try to capture feelings or emotions I can never seem to put into words. This includes exploring dreams and the surreal, trying to (and never fully being able to), capture the sense of loving and desiring another, or trying to tell people when you’re really not doing well. I am inspired and driven by these intangible feelings and my seeming inability to put them into words. I’m a very visual communicator and most of my work is an expression of a sentiment, a feeling, or a wider thematic issue I’m trying to come to terms with on a personal level. To that end, I’m very inspired by the human body and the idea of form, how the body can evoke and emote, and what it means to reorganise the form.

“My creative scene is based in Manchester. I’m very inspired by the city itself and the creative buzz that echoes around. I’ve found the creative community here so open and welcoming, it’s a great place to be as an artist right now.”

Kate is part of an upcoming video exhibition, They_Revolt: Queer Voices running at Sleepy Parrot Studios, Stockport from June 13-16.

@katepartingtonart

SOPHIE JOAN

“My approach to designing tends to be rooted in reflecting on my personal journey, whether that be exploring my identity or delving into the close relationships I have, to share and create a sense of community and emotion through the garments I create. With this, I tend to be inspired by poetry & literature, art history, blended with my love for tactile material.

“I became interested in design during lockdown as textiles became my salvation. My grandma would teach me how to knit and gave me her sewing equipment, as she was a skilled sewist when she was younger. Textiles became especially healing to me after she passed; I paid homage to her through a knitted installation memorial. In my Foundation course, I used my skill for textile art and conceptual ideas in my fashion design projects. My FMP looked at my personal struggles, researching into the concept of the ‘inner child’ and combining these ideas of growth, influence from environment and child-like wonder.

“Recently, I created a project named An Ode to Cloth for my university first year project, surrounding denim up-cycling. My project centres around celebrating the significance of cloth and the techniques used to create cloth, such as weaving. Inspired by historical tapestries, the denim is stripped back to appreciate the craftsmanship of the materials, making them even more valuable and precious, asking the viewer to slow down, cherish the crafting and embrace the cycle of mending.”

@sophjwilk

PRINN VAJRABHAYA

Credits

Director & cinematographer: Prinn Vajrabhaya @lately.studios
Cameraman+sound design: Josie Critchley @josie_8192
Editors: Prinn Vajrabhaya @lately.studios and Rohan Chandel
Typography: Stevie Akpa-Agwu
Music: Plushb4by @_rowenne and Aft3rsen @aft3rsen

"My name’s Prinn Vajrabhaya and I’m a Thai filmmaker-photographer based in south London and currently studying film & TV production at LSBU. AFTER HOURS is a short documentary film I directed about London’s rave scene, which invites the audience into an immersive world of a night out, from entering a club to meeting different people in the smoking area and getting lost in the music, narrated by club night creators.

“One of my favourite scenes is the match cut in the introduction. The two shots were filmed in the same location but portray two worlds, made different by music and people enjoying themselves. I also enjoyed editing together the grid sequence to capture the essence of a club smoking area, where people from all over interact and share brief intimate moments. My hope is that this film provides a window into new forms of nightlife and encourages people to venture outside, listen to new music, try new things, and meet new people.

“I love story-telling and capturing authentic fleeting moments. Nostalgia and sonder are themes that I constantly find myself returning to. I am fascinated by the timeless and dreamlike qualities of Justine Kurland's and Petra Collins's photography, but I always look to my friends and their stories for inspiration. I always have a camera with me on a night out and I’ll be hungover the next morning going through all the footage. Candid photos always carry the most genuine moments and encourage you to notice and appreciate your everyday life.

“Most of the film was shot in Peckham Rye, which is where I’ve been spending a lot of my time – there are so many events and venues there worth checking out. I’m working on another film and have some more exciting projects coming up!”

@lately.studios