The Young Producers are a collective of young people aged 18–25 who meet at the Fitzwilliam museum to socialise, create artworks and collaborate on exciting projects and events.
Since 2025, I have worked with the group on various projects to produce designs for exhibition interpretation and handouts, and have collaborated directly with the group to produce a range of merchandise for their summer Fitz Fest.
Journeys with Mai
Journeys with Mai was a UK-wide museum partnership project and touring exhibition centred around Sir Joshua Reynolds’ iconic 1776 Portrait of Mai (Omai). Find out more here.
The Young Producers responded to the painting by making gifts for Mai as the painting travels through Britain and the USA. Using what they learnt from Polynesian artists about their traditional artistic and craft practices, each group member has worked on individual offerings for Mai, reflecting a cross-cultural exchange of skills and knowledge between Cambridge and the Pacific Islands.
The design was mainly inspired by Kapa, or Tapa, a traditional, non-woven barkcloth made primarily from the inner bark of the wauke plant. The finished cloth is painted, stamped, or stenciled using natural vegetable and earth pigments.
The group created their own textured prints that I used on a recycled natural paperstock to mimick the look and feel of Kapa. They created bronze charms as offerings to Mai, which I laid out to resemble charms on a chain along the route that Mai would take from the Fitzwilliam to the Box in Plymouth.
Wishes to Mai from the group were included on the inside.
I used the playful typeface Ductus for the subheadings as it blends rigid geometric structures with calligraphic paths, bridging ancient and contemporary writing traditions.
Fitzwilliam Young Producers with their Journeys with Mai display