CV

CV or resumé is a necessary document when applying for any job. In CV, you summarise all important facts about yourself that your employer needs to know. It should include name, date of birth, address, contact information, education, previous work experience and skills. It is also good to include a short paragraph about you, languages you speak or hobbies that can be relevant to the job you are applying for.

Because I have written CV a couple of times before, during times I was looking for a job (and successfully I can say), the main focus of my research was the visual side of CV. Resumés for most jobs are meant to be plain and simple, but for jobs in the art industry, it is a good idea to have an interesting CV.

CVs that I found the most appealing to me were made by different graphic designers or graphic design students. They keep it simple but use icons, pictures, graphs and colours at the same time. Their colour palettes vary from dark to light colours and from a couple of colours to a bigger colour spectrum. The last four pictures show CVs that were very unique and apparently got creative jobs to their creators and I admire the originality of those although I decided to create something way more simple.

For my CV first I wrote down everything I need to include because I did not want to forget anything important. I was not sure if I should include my retail experience to a CV that is supposed to get me a job in the art industry, but I decided to use it because it taught me customer service, communication, flexibility and everything a person needs for dealing with customers or any people. That is why I think it is an important and very useful experience.

I worked on my CV in Photoshop, because I know the software very well and with a resolution of A3 paper with 300 dpi I think it is good enough for showing my CV to people. I worked in black and white because CV is usually printed out with a monochrome printer so it needs to work in black and white as much as in colour. It also helps to keep the values of colours right.

When it comes to colours, I used different colour palettes to see what would work the best. The first attempt was too bright and I continuously used less and less saturated colours. I also experimented with a dark and light background but decided that the dark one was too heavy so I used the light one. I am not a graphic designer, unfortunately, so it doesn't look as good as I would love to but overall I think it works and I really like the paint texture in the background. The last two pictures are the final versions of the CV, one with digitally drawn portrait and one with a photo of me.

References:

Armstrongappointments.com. (2018). 15 Creative Job Applications that Really Worked | Armstrong Appointments. [online] Available at: https://www.armstrongappointments.com/15-creative-job-applications-that-really-worked/.

Prospects.ac.uk. (2018). How to write a CV | Prospects.ac.uk. [online] Available at: https://www.prospects.ac.uk/careers-advice/cvs-and-cover-letters/how-to-write-a-cv.