I’m Madison Martell — a graphic designer with a painter’s habit of keeping everything.
I'm a graphic design student and artist working between print and paint. My practice begins with drawing — a mark, a margin, a mistake worth keeping — and that sketchbook logic carries into the design work: typography with a little friction, identities built from the hand rather than the template.
Most of what I make starts as a rough on paper before it ever reaches a screen. I'm interested in the space where a poster behaves like a painting, and where a portrait is allowed to stay unfinished.
Approach
I start with the material: paper, charcoal, ink, a ruler, a bad photocopier. Design decisions come out of those tests rather than a moodboard. Then I tighten it — grid, type, hierarchy — until the work reads clearly to someone who has never seen it before.
Interests & inspiration
Editorial design, independent magazines, calligraphy and hand-lettering, film photography, gallery bookshops, and the way a building's shadow falls at 4pm.
Background
Currently studying graphic design, with a studio practice in drawing and painting running alongside coursework.
Skills
- Branding
- Typography
- Editorial layout
- Illustration
- Drawing
- Painting
Programs
- Illustrator
- InDesign
- Photoshop
- Acrobat
Open to studio roles, internships, freelance and commissions.
Get in touchMadison Martell