Creative CVs

For the creative CV, I would want to present my information in a clean, creative manner, although at the same time I would want to make it look ‘arty’ with small illustrations for visual engagement, however having too much of those would make it look cluttered and visually distracting. To get an insight of the type of creative CVs out there I will look into various CVs and explore how each one represents the artist in terms of presentation, colour, design and layout. 

Key things I found when looking at different creative CVs - 

-        Lists of Education, generally grades of related courses to their career.

-        Short biography/profile. Some CVs don’t provide this information, although I think it is necessary to let the client briefly know who you are with a short statement.

-        Lists of work experience they had done. Can be of generic work experience you had done (retailing, etc.) though it is mostly of commissions and art related works/projects you were involved with clients.

-        List of relevant skills, mostly of programmes or primary tools they use as well as secondary skills that indirectly supports their professional practice, e.g. traditional skills with your primary skills are digital or vice-versa.

-        Visually imagery. Mostly a self-portrait illustration in the centre or foreground. Small illustrations or tally symbols to fill negative space to make it visually engaging.

-        Colours. Not much variety though I can see the reason for them to be in 1-2 colour tones (especially black and white) for a clean presentation. Most of them were either black and white or pale colours that mix well that doesn’t interfere with the text or making it visually unappealing to look at due to contrast.

Other CVs can be a practical or an interactive product like a booklet or flyer, though my personal taste is for a CV that is straight forward (like the ones I had looked into with the above creative CVs) with illustrations that makes it visually appealing.

Thumbnails for simple text placement

Version 1 of my CV. Putting in general information about myself as an artist and basic text placement.

2nd revision. Adding in basic shapes and small illustrations.

3rd revision. Adding more information and shapes to the CV. Also reflecting and evaluating on potential changes to improve the presentation of my creative CV.

Small illustrations and small logos to be placed on my creative CV. In order to personalise my CV to make it unique, I illustrated a character to be placed in areas with negative space to make it visually engaging so the CV is not just text, which could make it generic and somewhat plain. Discussion with my tutor recommended small illustrations just so there is something going on my CV, although not too many that will make it too cluttered. 

4 revision of my CV. Illustrations were added and had rearranged some of the text placement. 

Evaluating the current revised CV to see if any changes needed to improve the presentation.

After going through several revisions of my CV and getting some feedback from tutors, they advised not to put any illustrations simply because they will clutter around the CV (also pointing out that it doesn’t really make it anymore more presentable) though alternatively if I still wish to still use an illustration, I could use a large scale image that can be used in the background. After taking the feedback into account I decided to leave the illustrations out and just tweak the text/font accordingly to the annotations from the notes. 

Final version of my CV. Printed on normal paper (left) and on thick cartridge paper (right).

I decided to do some test printing whether my CV should be printed on cartridge paper or regular paper and the outcome in terms of quality is definitely better than on regular paper (the colours and sharpness is much clearer on cartridge paper). From this result cartridge paper will be used to print my CV.