Visuals I Added to My Image Archive: July
Ibiza in the 70's, warm hues and gathering Japanese inspiration
Hi everyone,
Hope you all had a great weekend. As most of you know, I’m going to travel for around 7 weeks to Asia (Vietnam, Japan and Singapore). The trip is in exactly one month and it’s coming sooo close, I’m very excited! I haven’t seen many places outside of Europe yet, but after visiting South Korea and Los Angeles last year, I knew I had to somehow made it work to take a break from work and focus on travelling.
It’s always been my plan, but unfortunately I graduated during the pandemic, had lost my side job to save up for a trip a year prior and had to deal with multiple very big losses in my family. Before I knew it, years passed and I had been working a lot. Using my max 30 days holidays a year to scatter across for small city trips here and there, but I was always craving more. And that’s coming now!
Today’s Post
A couple of weeks ago I told how I wrote about what it means to build an image archive today. After years of scrolling, saving, and moodboarding like everyone else, I started to feel like every reference looked the same. References from years ago kept popping up. I used Instagram a lot to find images, but it also makes it hard to find the underground cool artists. So I stepped away from the feed, started scanning things around me, and committed to building my own offline archive, filled with texture, history, and images that are part of offline curation and not made to go viral on for example Pinterest.
So today’s post I am sharing some of the images I’ve added to my archive and why. I honestly wish the image research was deeper for this first post, but I’ve mainly been at home or in bed for the last two weeks because of a face/jaw infection. That, (besides my 392093 YouTube screen time lol) also inspired me to scan and look at the books and magazines I’ve got in my house.
Building an Image Archive in 2025
In the age of infinite scroll, the concept of the image archive has shifted. What once referred to personal folders, institutional libraries, and hard drives of rare scans has now become a broader cultural dilemma. Everyone is archiving, but fewer people are curating with purpose.
Ibiza in the 70s - 90’s
As most of you know if you’ve been following me for a while, but I lived on Ibiza for a bit working in my parents boutique and in a bed & breakfast and restaurant. I used to visit the island a lot when I was growing up, and it’s always been and forever will be my goal to one day buy an old Finca and renovate it. Ideally close by the beach, with a farm and a beautiful garden. I had this Assouline book from Ibiza sitting in the living room for a long time, but never did more than flicking through it. The first thing I did was scanning images that spoke to me, as I really want to create more personal work and use inspiration that has a personal meaning to me.
Graphic Design Inspiration
I’m more of a visual- and conceptual art director, but I do have a background in branding and often have to do some graphic design related stuff. I noticed that I often go in autopilot and duplicate an earlier deck design that worked, often I don’t get any comments but I really wanted to step it up a bit. Inspiring myself to pay more attention to how images are laid out in a deck, how texts can sit over and image treatments. It’s not that I don’t put effort in my decks, but I do spend most time on the concept itself rather than the presentation of it and it’s something I really want to improve myself in.
Some Editorials
If you are a member of the Dazed Club (no spon haha) then you also can get access to the entire Dazed Archive. I love making it my mission to source old magazines and find editorials in there, but Dazed Club has been a game changer for me. There is basically each edition from the early 90’s up until today. I have been paying for over 2 years, yet I never went through the entire archive. I’m going through it issue by issue and screenshotting any images, layouts and editorials that speak to me.
One thing I do find when looking at editorials from the 00’s and 90’s is that it had a lot more life and movement to it. Models had more facial expressions, the poses weren’t as static as we see today. I’m collecting poses as a reference bible (maybe I can share more about that later), to start sprinkle into my projects and hopefully get the green light to simply have more fun in images!
In the recent Acne Paper (Golden edition) I ran into this spectacular editorial styled by George Krakowiak and photographed by Rafael Pavarotti. Art direction has so many different elements, but looking at styling as a form of art is definitely something I want to incorporate in personal projects as well. I do need good suggestions for stylists who are willing to collaborate with me and have great taste for personal projects (so please message me if you are a stylist who loves avant garde styling, subcultures and the intersection of sports and fashion).
Acne Paper
I’ve always been a cold hues and silver girly through and through, but I recently purchased the gold curated Acne Paper edition and have been obsessed. I scanned nearly every single image in there, because the warm tones really made me feel something.
As someone who works a lot across sports and fashion, I saved these covers of old health magazines. They reminded me of my visit to Muscle Beach in Los Angeles, a very fascinating place. The golden brown tan, the extreme physique of these men always give a little bit of ‘camp’ feeling, which is something I don’t reject aesthetic wise!
Nan Goldin Berlin
I love a good museum handout, especially when they age over time and you get a nostalgic feeling reading about the work. I wish I kept mine from a lot of amazing exhibitions I visited throughout my life, but I started saving these digitally and referring to the texts, images or layouts whenever I need to.
Purple Tokyo Diary
A book I am really into at the moment is Purple Tokyo Diary, a special edition from Purple Magazine that features interviews, stories and ways of working from artists across disciplines that are either from Japan or spent a long time working there. I’ve been reading every single page, getting so many insights in the way of thinking of the Japanese society, the history in natural disasters, war crimes and atomic bombs and the current pressure on today’s society. It’s been really interesting to learn about these things ahead of my trip. I’ll be sharing more scans from this next time, but I first wanted to have finished the entire book.
That was it for my image library update. I’m trying to do this every month! The coming months might get really exciting as I’ll be spending time in Vietnam (travelling from North to South for 4 weeks), Japan and Singapore. I have a lot more images I added to my library, but more random singular images.
Would love to know if you enjoyed this! If you have anything interesting you’ve seen recently, a source of finding images or a new artist that inspired you. Please drop it below in the comments, I’m very keen to explore more!
Love,
Zoe
Thoroughly enjoyed this! Thank you for sharing your thought process and the images that called out to you. Seeing images with movement and a point of view definitely made me realize how manufactured much of what I see online is.
That photo of Donyale Luna is stunning! I also love collecting visual epherma like museum pamphlets, free post cards, vintage magazines, etc but never thought to scan them! That would be a huge aid regarding saving space and reducing clutter. Thank you for sharing your archival adds! 💕