A concept helping to support young modern artists

Drella is the passion project of Renee Sedgewick, created in close partnership with Walton Fine Arts to support young, modern art artists on the one hand, and lower the barrier to entry in art buying outside of London. Rather than conforming to the traditional art gallery model, Drella was online only, with their primary physical “galleries” as one off art nights with live music and food in stunning surroundings. They approached us without a name for the art night or the gallery itself, let alone a brand identity or website.

The ‘Drella’ name is a nod to one of the biggest names in modern art, Andy Warhol. Drella was the nickname for Warhol first coined by Ondine. A contraction of Dracula and Cinderella to reflect the two sides of Warhol’s personality, Drella was a fittingly memorable tribute that perfectly aligned with the gallery’s core ambition of supporting young, modern artists. Speaking of which, Modern Heart was the name we suggested for their first art night – a self explanatory moniker that leaves visitors in no doubt about what they can expect to see.

Our neon-tinged identity for both Modern Heart and Drella is, on the one hand sharp and clean in Drella with angular serifs and both transparent and translucent windows overlaid over artwork. All of this conveys the sense of Drella being a blank slate – letting the artwork, and therefore the artists they have in their collection take centre stage at all times. The colour palette in our Modern Heart identity, on the other hand, adapts depending on the work of the artists being featured in the moment – starting with vivid colour block foils and flashes of neon, in keeping with Van Donna and E$cobar’s work. In creating an identity as flexible as this, we not only promote the latest additions to Drella’s gallery, but also make sure that Modern Heart is positioned as something new, something exciting, something more than a traditional art show or stripped-back gallery.