REGGAE | Naandeyé Garcia Villegas

IRIE™ Magazine | REGGAE - Naandeyé Garcia Villegas

Naandeyé Garcia Villegas

One Love

Naandeyé García Villegas is a graphic designer who studied the degree in Design and visual communication in the Faculty of Arts and Design of the National Autonomous University of Mexico, and the graduate in Visual Arts and multimedia in the Polytechnic University of Valencia, Spain.

She worked at Unanime Creative Agency, designing projects for high-profile clients from Russia and Spain.

In 2013 she returned to Mexico and founded naandeyeah, a visual laboratory dedicated to articulate analog and digital methods for editorial design projects, graphics, web development, and other experiments.

She is an art director at Weird Fishes, creative agency; and teacher at the undergraduate level, teaching courses on design theory and web development, at the Colegio de Estudios Superiores de México and at SAE Institute México.

She has received multiple awards and honorable mentions and has been a finalist in various poster contests: Reggae Poster Contest 2020 (Greece), PosterHeroes 2020 (Italy), Animayo 2020 (Spain), Haapsalu Graphic Design Festival 2019 (Estonia), Peru Design Biennial 2019 (Peru), International Poster Biennale Lublin 2019 (Poland), Taiwan International Design Award 2019 (Taiwan), Macau Design Award 2019 (China), Graphic Matters 2019 (Netherlands), Festival Internacional del Afiche (Argentina), Madrid Gráfica 2019 (Spain), Dydo Poster Gallery (Poland), Escucha mi voz 2019 (Mexico) Posterist in the world (Peru), Habana Latino Film Fest (Cuba), Poster Heroes 2019 (Italy), PosterFest (Hungary), Golden Turtle 2018 (Russia), 5th Moscow Poster Competition 2018 (Russia), Jazz in the Ruins 2018 (Poland), IDB_18 I Ibero-American Design Biennial 2018 (Spain), Mysterious Kraków. 40 years on the UNESCO World Heritage List (Poland), International Triennial of the Eco-poster The 4th Block (Ukraine), Poster Heroes 2018 (Italy), Taiwan International Graphic Design Award, PosterForTomorrow (Taiwan), Shanghai Biennial of Asia Graphic Design 2017 (China), International Poster Biennial for Peace Nanjing (China), International Poster Biennial Lublin 2017 (Poland), 9th National Design Biennial of Mexico 2017 (Mexico), Poster of the biennial Co2 (Colorado, EU ), Poster on the policy 2017 (Detroit, EU), Graphic Matters 2017 (Breda, Netherlands), Fl3tch3rexhibit (Tennessee, EU), Collective autopsy (Veracruz, Mexico), # MadridGráfica17 (Spain), TAG CDMX (Mexico), Master Minds (Mexico), Graphic Stories Cyprus (Cyprus), MUMEDI (Mexico), 8th Jeju, Korea United Designs (Korea), Virtual Biennial Prague 2016 (Prague), Flamantes (Spain), PosterPoster (Mexico), among others.

Between their prizes they emphasize: Golden Turtle and M68 (2018); San Diego Film Poster Design and GraphicsMatters (2017); Golden Prix, Virtual Biennale Prague (2016); Silver Mention Prize to! Design, by “Corporate Brand” (2014); and Bronze Quorum Prize, Multimedia category (2006), among others.

Her work as a designer has been published in digital media and editorial collections internationally; and has been exhibited in different countries such as Mexico, Italy, Russia, Poland, Korea, Holland, China, Taiwan, Cyprus, Spain, Czechoslovakia, Finland, Ukraine, Dubai, Iran, the United States, and Hungary.

At the same time, she has been a jury in some poster competitions both nationally and internationally.

The Interview

IRIE. When did you first realize that art would become your path in life?

Naandeyé. Since I was a child. Since I can remember I always had a special interest in art. I drew a lot, drew all the time. I loved the color and the letters. When I was 8 years old, my parents bought me a computer and a printer. At that time computers still didn’t have design programs, but mine had one installed in which you could write things (I suppose it was a kind of “word”), it was pure typography. You could choose the font (which were like 4 options) and the color; black and white. I spent whole afternoons making signs, “designing” them, then printing them and finally coloring on top of them (I had all kinds of markers, colors, watercolors, oil, etc).

That’s how my taste for design and art began, I guess. Since elementary school, I felt an attraction to the graphic world that marked my interests for life. I always got into workshops that had to do with painting, drawing, creativity. Fortunately I had an active education in which art and social conscience were given great importance. So I had incredible workshops (poetry, mask workshop, experimental painting workshop, creativity and psychology, etc.) that marked me forever and reinforced my taste for graphic arts.

Years later came in which I was defining my personality and my tastes, but I always drew. It was time to choose a career and without hesitation I chose design and visual communication. During those years I strengthened my taste for art, design, graphic communication, color and typography. I left college and did graphic design for several years. I was a graphic design teacher and I was passionate about understanding the symbolism of shapes and colors. I read a lot about design theory and art theory. However, I felt that something was missing. And it was there that I began my personal and professional search, my label.

I wanted to combine design and art. He didn’t want to advertise but he didn’t just want to paint, and he also had many political-social concerns. How could design, art, politics and culture be combined? I decided to start my way designing a social poster. I started to get deeply involved in the subject. I did a lot of research on it, I looked for countless graphic references, both from the past and the most contemporary. I came across the work of many designers who did what I wanted to do, I felt extremely identified and felt that I had found what I was looking for, and yes, I did, I found it.

At last, I felt that this was my path: design, illustration and the social poster.

IRIE. How did you first learn about the International Reggae Poster Contest?

Naandeyé. I was a professor of design theory for several years. It was while I was a teacher that I started looking for design contests so that my students could compete and take their design to a more realistic plane (outside the classroom, I mean).

Then I came across endless contests that caught my attention immediately and I wanted to enter as well.

This contest always caught my attention, and I had not been able to participate until this year.

I really like reggae, it has been with me during many work afternoons.

I like to design while listening to reggae. So this contest was a perfect fit for my profile.

IRIE. In creating your winning entry, One Love, did you have any struggles or happy accidents in achieving the final design?

Naandeyé. It’s funny because I developed the idea for this poster in a very natural way and I didn’t face any problems during the creative process (with my other posters I always go through several phases, and in some cases I let days go by without working on any of them because I get stuck or because the subject is difficult for me). With ‘One Love’ everything was very natural, very organic. I thought about the concept in one day and the poster was done in five. I think that the taste for the subject made the process much more fluid than with other projects.
 

IRIE. What are you currently working on as an artist?

Naandeyé. I am the art director of a design agency and I also have my own naandeyeah projects, where I develop social, environmental, and cultural projects. I always have a lot of work.

At the same time, I never stop drawing and designing posters of a social nature. It’s really what I’m passionate about. Currently, my work is exhibited in various places around the world.

IRIE. What advice would you give someone looking to pursue art as a career?

Naandeyé. Go ahead! The way of art is the noblest. The key is to do things with a lot of passion to feel satisfied. Success comes only when we are truly passionate about what we do. The journey can be slow because it requires a lot of discipline, but the satisfaction is infinite. Art is the way, without a doubt.

IRIE. Much Love & Respect, Naandeyé!


Official Website:

Naandeyeah.com