Decca Records buys former Cardonald College student’s artwork

By Karen Thomson

A LONDON record label has bought the rights to a former Cardonald College, Glasgow student’s artwork.

Euan Clark, who studied for an HND in illustration, sold the rights to his work Me and Beethoven to Decca, which is a part of the Universal Music Group.

The work which was uploaded to the college’s graphic design blog, Graphic Gratification, had initially been purchased by Stylorouge, which is notable for making designs for record labels.

Decca will be using Clark’s adapted illustration over printed marketing for a masterworks collection of Beethoven’s work.

The piece was created in response to a brief about a student’s hero and the rights to edit it have been bought over by the company.

Clark said: “I was absolutely flattered. Not only that an award-winning design firm wanted to work with me but that they recommended my work to a major record label (Decca) and they wanted to get me involved in the project.

“It just proves that the right piece of work can really open doors for you.”

Speaking about his time at Cardonald, Clarke said: “I did the HND before in 2006-08 and failed at the last hurdle. I was too young, lazy, overwhelmed and inexperienced.

“After a year out I went back to the new HND and with my previous technical knowledge spent the last two years focusing – like many of my classmates - on my design process.

“The lecturers were really supportive and encouraging. I honestly wouldn’t have made it through the course without them. This was of most helpful for preparing a portfolio for university and I was accepted for direct entry into third year at Glasgow Caledonian to study for an honours degree in graphic design for digital media.”