In this month of September 2020, Orléans School of Art and Design is publishing a collective book composed of this very special year’s graduates’ works (DNA et DNSEP).

This special collection is made of several threads. First the graduates, in 2020 forced to think and bravely talk about their degree projects inside the limited space of a screen, and for most of them, a PDF format. Despite the COVID-19 and lockdown measures, the thread between students, teachers and co-ordinators has never been broken. In June, the students graduated in proper form, thanks to the tenacity of the whole school and in particular the co-ordinators, Panni Demeter, Claire Le Sage, Emmanuel Cyriaque and Gunther Ludwig. The projects were thought-out and fully developed, compiled by Marlène Bertoux from documents produced by the students, printed and crafted by Clémence Brunet, and hand-bound by Maryse Tranchet, each booklet is proof of this intense and exacting work.

Another thread of the work, is that of a graphic spirit, inspired by the visual identity of the year, devised by four students at Orléans School of Art and Design: Antoine Buon, Laëtitia Cuchet, Éléonore Fines and Lucie Sahuquet, under the attentive gaze of Nicolas Girard. This thread is a typography, an installation, a signage system, four tarpaulins stretched on the façade, the 2020 student’s book, and cut from the first of these four tarpaulins, the tote bag / cover of this large publication. Carried out in this particular context, this graduate’s book is as much an art object as a commemorative object. As such, it has no title, insofar as it could have 82. If it should have a title, there is one that could fit, that of the graduates’ exhibition whose title speaks for itself: Uncool Memories (18 September – 2 October).

Emmanuel Guez, 11 September 2020.

The publication can be seen during the exhibition Uncool Memories #1.