Image Courtesy of Elliott Burford

Image Courtesy of Elliott Burford

Fabrica, the famous creative clan of Benetton, always looks for the next thrill. It was about time then it entered for inspiration in our mail boxes, contaminating them with tones of wit. The idea is simple but effective, imaginative and funny: how would it look if some crazy designer (call him Elliott Burford) took his pen and made out of the surreal titles of spam some half-naive illustrations? The result couldn’t look better since Burford reinterpreted and visualized with a lot of success the often messy titles of junk mail that are used by spammers in order not to be detected by spam filtering techniques.

Image Courtesy of Elliott Burford

Image Courtesy of Elliott Burford

Image Courtesy of Elliott Burford

Image Courtesy of Elliott Burford

We should notice here that those techniques work by searching for patterns and keywords in the headers or bodies of messages, identifying offenders and deleting. That’s why spammers intentionally misspell commonly filtered words and use increasingly abstract sentences. Elliott recently presented his “Elliott Burford is Spam” exhibition at the (amazing we must say) Fabrica Features store in Lisbon ( Rua Garrett n° 83, 4° Floor // 1200-203 Lisbon – Portugal ), featuring a book of illustrations. The results are more than pleasing: Elliott Burford’s take on spam is so surprising and uplifting that we at Yatzer have no choice but shout that if junk mail looks so good, then spam me baby at a daily basis!

Image Courtesy of Elliott Burford

Image Courtesy of Elliott Burford

portrait of Elliott Burford

portrait of Elliott Burford

Elliott Burford is a graphic designer and art director who also works in visual arts. He was born in 1984 and raised in Adelaide, Australia. His experience in design and advertising across Australia, Europe and the US samples a cross section of small to multinational clients. From branding, packaging and corporate literature to tattoos, clocks and stationery collections, his focus remains on identity, singular concepts and communication. Burford currently lives in Treviso, Italy, as a resident in Fabrica.

Image Courtesy of Elliott Burford

Image Courtesy of Elliott Burford

Launched in 2001, Fabrica Features is the name of a series of retail shops that sell Fabrica’s design articles and double as multiethnic and multimedia spaces where exhibitions, screenings, live performances and workshops offer major opportunities for people to meet. The Fabrica Features stores facilitate a commercial exchange of art and a fusion of cultural events in a global network. Today, in addition to Lisbon, the Fabrica Features spaces are hosted in Bologna (Italy), Hong Kong (China) and Istanbul (Turkey). Fabrica Features boasts also innovative ‘temporary stores’ which have visited cities such as Paris (France), Rotterdam (Netherlands), London (UK) and Porto (Portugal).

Image Courtesy of Elliott Burford

Image Courtesy of Elliott Burford

Image Courtesy of Elliott Burford

Image Courtesy of Elliott Burford

Image Courtesy of Elliott Burford

Image Courtesy of Elliott Burford

Image Courtesy of Elliott Burford

Image Courtesy of Elliott Burford

Spam me baby!

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