Better Lives blog 4, peer review
For my 4th blog post I chose to reflect on the work of Alma de Ganay. I enjoyed being in the same Better Lives course as Alma (‘Make-Up Breakdown’) and had the opportunity to work with her during the workshop in which we studied contouring. We were shown how to apply our new knowledge in a practical and creative way by working together, using each-others’ faces as the canvas. On this occasion I experienced her working with make-up and her open, interested and creative approach to the subject made me curious and excited about her final project of this unit.
The way Alma describes her approach to projects and her usual work processes as a Creative Direction student is very close to the way mine are. The workflows are similar in the sense that, as a PR and communications student, a major amount of my work is also based on thorough and intensive research. Alma also mentioned that the main theme of the project ‘Fashion Mistake and Imperfection’ played into her hands, in the sense that as a non-professional in make-up she would be prone to make mistakes along the way. I was able to relate very well to this statement, due to my inexperience and limited knowledge of make-up. I really enjoyed using the topic of ‘fashion mistakes and imperfections’ as a narrative for our final projects in this unit. It allowed us to experiment with courage and fun and to learn through the creative processes without being limited by the fear of making mistakes.
I like the fact that Alma has used the Vogue Make-Up tutorials as her main source of inspiration, as I love to watch them myself. Suitable to the topic ‘Fashion Mistake’, I usually enjoy the videos best, in which the celebrities allow themselves to make a few mistakes during their tutorial – it makes the whole process very charming and authentic.
I personally believe that Alma’s idea to rather engage in the process of applying make-up instead of focusing on a perfect finished look, is very exciting and interesting. Her project clearly shows that anything that looks like a mistake during a work process might as well lead the path to a successful final outcome. This once again demonstrates that we shouldn’t always dismiss mistakes as failures so quickly, but that even if mistakes happen, we should continue, learn from them and always look ahead.