We spoke with Virginia Mori about illustration how a means to express ideas
Usually we think to the artist — whatever art he/she deals with — as a solitary genius who is able to create memorable works out of the blue, without any alphabet or grammar. Thus, masterpieces such as Michelangelo’s David, Dante Alighieri’s Divine Comedy or Pablo Picasso’s Guernica become unique testimonies of the immeasurably creative nature of their creators.
Very few people reflect on the need, for professionals working in the artistic field, to have a proven method. That instead, especially for those with a more rational and scientific mindset, is crucial.
Talent is indispensable and there is no “school” that can bring it about. But you still need to discipline it, cultivate it with fatigue and work. In summary, to become an artist with a distinguishable style, the genetic heritage is essential but not sufficient. As Malcolm Gladwel states, “achievement is talent plus preparation”.
With Virginia Mori, an Illustrator and Animator born in Italy in 1981, we talked about this topics during a Talk of the series Digital Heroes. She studied animation and design at the State Art Institute in Urbino, and now lives and works between Pesaro and Milan. During the years she nurtured and honed her distinctive artistic imagination: her favourite media are pencil, ink, and ballpoint pen on paper.
To creating her own style, Virginia has taken inspiration from authors, movements and trends born over the centuries in different areas of the world: from French cinema to Japanese manga.
Aware of their means and the possibility of reaching — thanks to them — a large audience, she used a method to find her own way to become a recognizable talent. An awareness that came with the web, which gave Virginia the opportunity to expose her animations, drawings and books without having to expose herself, to “put your work in the middle and see what happens. […] My personal brand has started to grow and many people have started to follow me, to contact me for works or exhibitions, I began to have several stimulating exchanges with artists whom I respect and from there it all started.”
A work in constant evolution. Virginia Mori, in fact, considers technique only as a means of achieving a more important goal, expressing ideas that go beyond the personal tastes of her admirers. This is why, despite being very fond of certain tools, she has adopted the opportunities offered by digital technology to invade new unpredictable fields. [An example is the animation created for the music video to the song “Submarine Test January 1967” by John Mayer]
Just what the most innovative organizations do. The relationship between creativity and method, especially for companies operating in the world of communication and marketing, is never in constant equilibrium: methods and styles of work are functional to the products and services that are created, varies according to size and characteristics of the team, evolves with the evolution of the market and of the whole society.
Every organization is more than a group of people. An organization is a group of people with a purpose. This purpose is the ultimate difference when you appear two different organizations, but in the end all the organizations, regardless of their purpose, exist to create value.
We, Imille, are an organization that wants both to grow and last over time.
This is the reason why we don’t want just to create value, but create shared value. And this is the reason why we adopted a method — Organization as a Platform — bringing simple rules and tools, letting great people make the magic happens. Creativity, in this scenario, is a decisive factor for any result, to be activated methodically according to the objective to achieve. It is no coincidence that our new Creative Director and Head of Storytelling works with a cross-cutting team, both in terms of skills and geographic origin: Content Designers from Italy,
