Indigo Slaney-Smith - GRAPHIC DESIGNER

Indigo Slaney-Smith is a talented graphic designer based in Plymouth, Devon. Many of her recent works are based around important social issues, such as the destigmatisation of sex, as well as more current subjects like COVID-19. She wishes to venture into the world of visual communication and graphic design for advertising, and is planning on attending university to build on her existing skills and portfolio. She has done a fantastic job on some of the artwork that features on our website, so we took the opportunity to ask her more about her artistic journey so far.

Born in Scotland, Indigo moved to Cornwall at a fairly young age, meeting our very own Lydia at Callington Community College during her time at school. Her passion for art was sparked by watching her older sister, who she has always had a very close relationship with. After a few years at art college that ran alongside a full time employment, she simultaneously applied for a foundation course and met her boyfriend Isaac (@permanent.reminder) who is a talented professional tattoo artist.

Being surrounded by passionate, artistic people has been a big source of motivation for Indigo, especially from those she has close relationships with - she tells us that Isaac, as well as her friends and family, are the people who inspire her work the most.

“When they’re pushing you forward, and you’ve done something, and they’re actually happy for you, that pushes me...the constant appraisal from my mum as well is really useful. I told her about you guys and I told her I have stuff to do, and she was like fuck yeah!”.

We all agreed how important it is to be surrounded by those who are encouraging and enthusiastic about your artistic endeavours, as many people don’t always get that kind of support.

Stylistic influence and inspiration tends to come from a wide range of places for Indigo, rather than from specific artists. Many of her ideas come from her own experiences of the world around her. She confesses that she’s always been drawn to the appearance of alcohol bottles - something she shares with her parents, who have themselves collected a number of beautiful bottles from many different sources. This love for unique kinds of vessels has driven her to start researching and entering that particular line of work, and we’re really looking forward to seeing how she shares that joy in the things she creates (and we absolutely agree that there’s no shame in hoarding pretty things!).

When we asked her about what message she wants her work to convey, Indigo told us about her most recent project, that discusses destigmatizing sex and, in particular, the sexual expression of women. “People are okay with sex and it can be used in everything, as long as it’s a super vanilla attractive white heterosexual couple on TV,” she says. As part of this project, she explored aspects of sexuality through the female form, with the aim to normalise and celebrate women’s sexuality however it manifests.

She stresses the importance of proper sex education (rather than our shared experience of sex education at school, which mainly consisted of “put a condom on a cucumber and that’s it”) and open discussion of topics surrounding sex that may be considered taboo, such as kink, as well as more focus on queer sex and representation. We spoke about the amazing Shan Boodram and her very informative series ‘Sexology’ on Quibi (which we highly recommend) where they focus on different areas of sex in a comfortable supportive environment.

Lydia -

‘I would love to see Indigo and her do a collab some time!’

Mads - “All they told us about non-standard sex and being LGBTQ in secondary school was essentially ‘gay sex is a thing but we’re not gonna teach

you about it,

you can figure

that out for yourself.’”

As we’re rapidly approaching Pride Month, the encouragement of more comprehensive sex education and media representation is a very relevant topic. Human beings are so diverse and beautiful in so many different ways, and we believe that everyone deserves the love, support, and education they need to fully realise and celebrate who they are. We’re planning on featuring a number of queer artists and topics on our blog throughout June, so watch this space!

Indigo has also created some pieces concerning love during coronavirus, and really enjoys discussing current global themes through art. We all agree that conversation and collaboration between artists is key in helping us all get through the hardships of this pandemic.

From here on out, Indigo plans to take on more commission work as she goes to university, building her design portfolio and creating more beautiful art. We loved working with her and are excited to keep collaborating with her into the future. If you like her art as much as we do, you can contact her at IndigoslaneySmith@gmail.com, or find her on instagram at @slaneysmit - so go and show her some love! <3