This week we have a special guest. We’ve had a nice little chat with founder of Desktopography, Pete Harrison. A great interview about Pete’s career and more specifically his Desktopography project. Read about how this digital art legend worked himself up in the graphic design world and how he’s created a life we all would love to have. Enjoy this interview with Pete Harrison and get some of the finest wallpaper of Desktopography’s latest exhibition.

1. Welcome to WallpaperArt and please introduce yourself. Could you tell us where you’re from and how you got started in the field?
Hello! I’m Pete Harrison, and go by the alias ‘aeiko’ which is pronounced ‘eye-ko’. Ever since I was younger I was creative and wanted to follow this direction in life, When I was 10 I wanted to be a graphic designer. Knowing this I was able to tailor my education around what I wanted to become. At school I studied art and design, same at A-Level. I went to University and studied MediaLab Arts. This 4 years of my life can best be described as a metaphor…

MediaLab arts is a car crash between two vehicles travelling at extraordinary speeds that takes four years to happen. In one car are internationally recognized computer scientists able to teach programming and control of visual media. In the other are artists, musicians, theorists and designers who are determined to reinvent how art, language and human beings are represented in the 21st century. Miraculously everyone walks away from the crash unscarred, and from the wreckage emerges a software artist able to operate at an exceptionally creative level in both corporate and cultural industries.

So I knew I wanted a career in the creative industries.. during University I started creating digital art, and by the time I had finished I had quite a few artworks to show, so I set up a website to showcase these. I began posting on a few community and social sites and networking with other designers and illustrators. I was featured in a few magazines and books and exposure started to grow. I took a full time job in London working at an agency, and while I was here I set up a clothing label as a hobby, I called this Funkrush, and commissioned a bunch of friends to do some designs for me.

Funkrush developed very fast and now showcase’s designs by some of today’s top illustrators and designers as well as being stocked in shops all over the UK and Europe. Alongside this (and my full time job) I decided to take up freelance and gained some high end clients in the fields of graphic design, web and interactive media, my online presence was still expanding. I was recognized by Computer Arts magazine as one in ten internationally recognized designers in the year 2006.

As you can imagine I was super busy, I was getting more freelance projects and Funkrush was expanding even bigger, so I decided to quit my agency job and take up freelance full time. I moved back to Devon, southwest UK – this is where I grew up, although I loved London I think this place suits my lifestyle more. In between all of this I set up the Desktopography project and got loads of friends involved in that too.

About a year ago I was chatting with my friend Olly Moss and we decided to set up a new project, called SuperCombo it sells unique, high quality clothing and items inspired by our love of video games, anime and general nerdyness. Its pretty new and runs as a sister company to Funkrush, keep an eye on that because we have lots of great ideas and products to come!

So this is what I currently do… I’m a freelance graphic designer running a few creative projects on the side, you can read more about me on my website.

2. Desktopography is running 5 years now. Please tell us how you started Desktopgraphy. What were your plans and did you ever expected it would become so big?

Actually my friend Kharil sent me this image in 2005, it was a basic background of some mountains with some minimal design elements and typography, I thought that this was a really nice thing to see, (called TAG in the 2005 exhibition) it inspired me to create my own. Then I stumbled across a work by James with a similar concept to the 2 we already created, we shared these with a few people and they seemed to be popular. I asked a couple of friends to create an exclusive piece and we put them on a website that I called Desktopography (desktop, as in desktop wallpaper, topography as in to represent natures surface), it has developed ever since!

3. After 5 years, what can we expect in the future from Desktopography?

I cant believe its been running 5 years already! haha, anyway next year (2010) we will release a limited edition book, a publisher has shown interest and we will be making a physical product, more like an art book. This will also include exclusive wallpapers you can only get with the book, and all our music albums including an exclusive album too. Next year probably a new website too and of course the 2010 exhibition which will probably feature a twist

That sounds really nice!

4. Next to Desktopography you also run your own freelance career and of course your Clothing label Funkrush. How do you manage to keep up with everything?

Well I do keep a kind of diary with things to do everyday, sometimes its very hard to juggle..as I’m pretty unorganized haha! I try and concentrate on one thing at a time, and prioritize too! I do have a great social life too, and enjoy playing halo 3 and guitar hero haha :p !

5. Thanks for your time and we wish you the best of luck  with Desktopography! Do you want to share anything with our readers?

Don’t forget to sign up to the newsletter! and follow me on twitter for updates – www.twitter.com/aeiko_
Also buy some nice clothes from Funkrush, or SuperCombo !
Thanks, I think this project is great, good luck to the guys that run it, of course I will support it
Pete

Here is a quick selection of some of our favourite wallpapers of Desktopography‘s latest exhibition.

Paperplanes By Chris Koch

Download wallpaper here – Desktopography

My Global Announcement By Christian Werther

Download wallpaper here – Desktopography

Urban Environment By Craig Shields

Download wallpaper here – Desktopography

The_surrealography By Jordy Roelofs

Download wallpaper here – Desktopography

Global Freezing By Anthony Giacomino

Download wallpaper here – Desktopography

Two By Marius Bauer

Download wallpaper here – Desktopography