Italian creative studio CaroselloLab launched Designers Against Coronavirus over a month ago. Today, the website showcases over 400 COVID-19 related posters, illustrations, and artwork by creatives from 44 countries. The archive shows the crisis through the eyes of designers, illustrators, and creative studios from all over the world.
We reached out to founder Enrico Caputo, creative director of CaroselloLab, an independent brand design and communication agency, where he heads a team of seven people in their studio in Milan. With Italy’s lockdown going into its seventh week they have all been working from home.
Image: Lundgren-Lindqvist
Hi Eric, we’ve been following the growing collection of artwork over the past couple of weeks. We were intrigued because of the quality and sheer volume of the collection, and also because the site originated in Milan, where the pandemic has struck particularly hard. You and the team must have been in lockdown for a few weeks now, how has the COVID-19 crisis affected your work?
I must say working from home has been quite productive since everybody in the team had the opportunity to take a break from the day-to-day routine and focus more on his/her style, goal and dreams.
Exactly one month ago, we launched DAC – Designers Against Coronavirus: a digital archive of COVID-19 related artwork curate by us, with the goal of raising funds for the Italian and the International Red Cross. It is going very well, since then we reached 7000 followers on Instagram, more than 12000 unique visitors to the website and we have received over 2000 submissions from almost every country in the world. We selected around 400 artworks from 44 countries and we are still publishing on the website on a daily basis. I would like to use this chance to thank everybody who participated and who’s following us and donating.
Awesome! Can you tell us a bit about your current personal situation, working from home?
I usually wake up at 7am, work for a couple hours on my personal photography archive and website. After that, I answer emails before the daily group chat with my team at 9:30. We work on the studio’s projects for the rest of the morning. At 2pm we usually publish some new artworks on DAC website, after which we go back to work until 6:30pm. Then it’s time to do yoga with my wife, to cook, eat, sleep, repeat.
After receiving all these submissions from creatives around the world, what do you think that design can do in times of Corona?
I saw hundreds of initiatives like ours popping up in the last couple of weeks — and that is good. They keep people busy, inspired, and sometimes they aim to raise funds. I really like what the Instagram page homelife_stilllife is doing: a nice and inspiring collection of still life photography shot at home during the quarantine: every post has a backstage, I think it’s pretty cool.
Do you have any tips for our creative community?
I think the best thing a young designer can do during the quarantine is to research, work hard on his/her style, try new things, and contribute to initiatives like ours. If you are lacking paid work, try to find some clients in your area that might need your services, work on something you think they should do in the very next future, prepare a nice presentation, and share it with them.
Image: Tommaso Delmastro
Image: Malika Favre
Image: M/M Paris
Image: Kim Costantino_CaroselloLab
Image: Gio Pastori
Image: Futurneue
Image: Elisa Seitzinger
Image: Daniele De Batté – Artiva
Image: Carosello Lab
Find the full collection of artwork on www.designersagainstcoronavirus.com.