Show& Tell: Typography

For show & tell this week, I brought in Mark Danielewski's "House of Leaves." There's a lot going on in this story, and the different typefaces help distinguish between the three concurrent narrators.

In addition, the typography begins to get crazy as the events within the house become crazy. Sometimes words will run up and down a page to mimick movement along a staircase, or only a single word will be on a page so you feel the narrator's increasing isolation, or the type will be backwards to show his movement through a place. This treatment is always a thoughtful decision that reflects the story--it's never done as a decorative element, it's done because it adds to the story. In addition, there is a page of braille, there are crossed out lines in red, missing text, text overlap, etc.

It's very fascinating and even though it can get tedious to read a footnote that extends into a story on the following pages, and then turn back several pages to get to the original story that had the footnote; and to turn the book 360 degrees while reading, it's quite the experience that adds to the act of reading. I suggest reading and trying it to see how it effects you.

REDESIGN, Project 3: Call to Action

I'm a strapped for time this week. But I had an epiphany and am now redesigning my phase 4 comps for Project 3. While I like where I'm going with this, I'm wondering if I've "been in the monkey house too long" and can't smell the stink.

So here are the before and afters. Please let me know what you think and if you have any suggestions--if you don't like the new ones, please say so, considering the professors won't hesitate to point out everything wrong, I'd rather not walk into class disillusioned that I had a good idea, but then again, maybe you'll like them...? I'd greatly appreciate comments, although understand, again with the time budget, I don't know what changes, if any, I'll be able to get to. But thanks!

Magazine ad:
















Post card: the redesign isn't quite finished, and I forgot to make a jpg of the old version--but it was horizontal and it had a picture of the movie poster and book cover and it said VISION.

Design Ethics: Shepard Fairey

I was meandering on the web, when I found myself in the art section of the Obama store. If you scroll down to the sold out, iconic red, white and blue image of Obama and CHANGE poster at the bottom, you'll see Shepard Fairey was the artist. What made me think twice about him was in his quote he wrote, "I know I have an audience of young art fans," which I think is an interesting statement and I wanted to know more about him.

Well, it turns out he's the designer behind my favorite fashion line (OBEY)! And let me clarify by "my favorite fashion line," I mean, my favorite shirt is an OBEY shirt, and it's the only one in the line own, but I do heart it a lot and as a result OBEY is probably one of the only fashion lines I can name. But to continue on...

I was super excited to find out more about Mr. Fairey's company, past, art skills etc. (a la Wikipedia), but then I came upon this page: Obey Plaigerist Shepard Fairey. Essentially, the article claims that Fairey has pilfered the majority of his works from dead and living artists. He reappropriates art and imagery into a new context, but usually changes very little or none of the art itself, and he mass markets it under the presumption that it is his own work--never giving credit to the original artist or piece. [The side by side comparisons in the article are quite incriminating. Some look like exact replicas.] And, as the article points out, not only does he do this--he profits from it. Essentially, the article claims, he is stealing both art integrity and money from the original artists.

I'm just curious where people stand on this. Is Fairey a hack who has crossed the ethical design line? Has he cut ethical corners like any other business man does? Can he claim it as his own because he has created it in a new context? If it's not copyrighted and in the public domain--either because it's too old or was never registered--is it fair game? Is Fairey taking advantage of the fact that is hard to patrol and penalize art/idea theft? Does the belief, that an artist has a moral obligation to other artists to respect their work, exist in other career fields or is special to the art field because our creations are personal?

I'd like to know what you all think on any of this. Also, if you read my previous post on Foundation for a Better Life, you'll see that a similar thing happened to me--I love something, google it, then find obscure article blasting it. And like in real life, I'm having trouble finding the final Truth on the subjects on the Web. Ahh, elusive Truth, where have you gone?

Week 6 Reading: Bang!

I really liked and really disliked this book. I thought it accomplished what it set out to do, but I had the occasional disagreement. (And what's with the cover? According to her writing, the way the white pops insinuates that she is the most important thing--I would have thought the title. And why the "mediation" configuration? I suppose the centered-ness makes the reader focus on it longer, but it feels much less dynamic.)

Dislikes:
Her word choice/tone. Example: the word "innards," the story of her art prof. on p. 52, referring to "drunken blood shot eyes" in a kid's book (I'm going on the basis that this is intended for kids b/c that's where the library shelves it). I think she's trying to be casual (or un-intellectual), but she kind of comes off as a know-it-all. Her over explaining gets tedious. Her redemption was flipping the page and reading, "The wolf looks stupid now..." (p. 34). That was laugh out loud hilarious.

Likes:
I thought her Little Red Riding Hood images were successful. Principle #9 was helpful, to paraphrase, we associate things of the same color as being together more than things of the same shape. I also enjoyed the image constructed by the 8th grader at the end of the book.

Highlight:
The images on page 82-83. To paraphrase again, some pictures are contained within their space and the viewer is left outside of it, but when our eyes notice an object within the picture, we move into the picture. I though the corresponding images to this idea were perfect. As a beginning designer, I see (and make) some really bad design, but am not sure what it is that's missing, why it feels so amateur, and now I realize that usually it's because the viewer wasn't brought into the design, the piece existed in its own space without the viewer. Being aware of this is going to be helpful.

Show & Tell: Classification

It's not super exciting, but my classification this week was from Real Simple. The article classified things that cause you to lose your focus: lack of sleep, stress and anger, age and genetics, and modern distractions. Then they tell you how to regain your focus in each of the categories. I liked that they weren't classifying objects, but more so, I really liked their photos that went with the spread. They're done by photographer, Nato Walton (the article is by Kristyn Krusek Lewis). I like these photos because they augment the article's concept. It's very subtle, but look what being distracted causes: mismatched shoes, pouring salt instead of sugar and burning your ironing. It's just that the placement of the pull quote makes you see the mismatched shoes. The circle on the coffee mug makes you see the salt stream, and you see the red dress first but then you see the burn mark pointing to it. So it's all very subtle but it works.

(Side note, man I dislike how the photos display/layout in this template blog.)

Project 4: Classification

So, I want to classify humanitarian causes to make people realize that it's better to be more passionate about one unjust cause than to feel overwhelmed by them all and do nothing.

Classifying international humanitarian causes
The principle: Classify by cause/crisis

• Genocide/mass murder - Darfur,
  
• Famine/Hunger (would vegetarian/vegan issues fit under this?)
  
• Disease - AIDS, bird flus, STDs, doctors without borders
  
• Environmental - stopping climate change, government regulation, areas impacted by natural disasters
• War - Iraq, Afhganistan (should this be under genocide?)
• Domestic Issues - US-specific causes
• Civil Liberties - slave trade/racism, sexual slave trade/sexism, rights to all people regardless of class, creed, age, sex etc.

The categories are fairly broad--which I think is ok?--but the "classes" aren't parallel exactly, does that matter? Wondering what you all think, if some might work better than others and if I left anything major out? I'd like to cover a wide spectrum.

Week 5 Reading

Here are a few gems from this week's reading in McQuade & McQuade, Chapter 5: Tip, don't skip the reading pieces this week.

• "How to Live" by Annie Dillard, p. 426-428
• "Coming into the Country" by Gish Jen, p. 434-436
  
• "Cool like Me" by Donnell Alexander, p. 440-443. I really fell for this one, when I read, cool is "about making a dollar out of a 15 cents." I think this could be a starting point for a discussion on the connection between the current "hipster" cool that steals from low-class culture--trucker hats, flannel/plaid shirts and mohawks/mullets. Originally I thought an article on cool was going to be, well, lame. But Alexander really does understand cool. The synthesis of difference and living by it, not just wearing it or speaking it, but being it.
  
• "24 People for whom I haven been mistaken" by Roger Shimomura, p.474-475
  
• "National Museum of the Middle Class Opens in Schaumburg, Il." by The Onion. p. 488-89. What was greatest about this piece is their decsribing the middle class workers work week--eight hours a day, five days a week, and weekends off, and it makes it so clear that this is NOT the way we, people, have to live their lives. It's how we choose to or are made to choose to. The work week is just a construct and I think everyone's lives would be a lot better if the system would reevaluate what is best for the people and the economy regarding the balance of work and life. (I strongly support afternoon siestas and shutting down for the month of August. Ohhh France!)

Pick of the Week: Nikki Lee's collection from p. 407-419. The images were fairly intersting in their own right, but when I was reading her bio and realized that it was her in every image, that she had worked her way into each of the different subcultures, I was blown away. Mostly, I'm curious about how she infiltrated these cultures. She altered her "hair, makeup, clothing, body language, and even weight to fit in." It seems and makes me question the level of deception. Did her new friends know nothing about her project, did they know anything of her when the make-up and clothes were off? If so, how did they feel? If not, how did they feel when she was suddenly no longer a part of their lives? (I'm making the assumption that if she didn't tell them, she must have removed herself from them, because how could she maintain so many facades simultaneously.) The photos ask who are you and what makes you you? But they also seem to be answering that you are shaped wholly by your environment. Perhaps, if we were provided with her personal feelings regarding her experience, we could see the role that nature (ie genetics, ethnicity etc) played and/or intertwined with environment.

Show & Tell: Call to Action

My calls to action are from the Foundation for a Better Life.
I'm a huge fan of these billboards. They tend to hit home in the heart area.



The call to action is gentle. Pass it on. Be a better person. But I really like having this reminder amid the masses of McDonalds billboards and cheap motels along the highway. I don't think people are inherently good--well I do sort of--but I think people should still put the efforts into actually being good people as in, actually doing good things. And I feel like what the Foundation considers "good" is in line what I think is good.

However, recently, I found an article that said the FFABL was listed to some rich oil tycoon: article here. Thanks for crushing my hopes Portland Indymedia. I haven't fully read it yet, so I'm not sure how or if it will change how I view these billboards. Can bad people do good things? Is it deceptive that these ad campaign, perhaps comes from someone who does not represent them?

And interesting enough, I received this quote in my inbox today:

Journalism is publishing what someone doesn't want us to know, the rest is propaganda. -Horacio Verbitsky

which I thought was interesting/relevant, because Portland Indymedia calls the ads propaganda.

Bad Ad

I wasn't sure what I was going to post for my second post this week, until I found this bad ad: 

I'm don't think it's my preference that I think this is bad. I understand that sex sells and some provocative ads sell well. But I think this doesn't work because the creators have misunderstood the audience. I found it in Rolling Stone magazine from a few months ago. I feel like Macy's was like, hmm, Rolling Stone, yeah, lets be edgy and racy and raw and we'll use the youthful, sex angle. But it still feels like a mall shopping store ad that happens to be using a naked person. They completely lost the fantasy world that usually emanates from a sexy ad--although, they try to incorporate it with that reflective mirror effect. which feels creepy and inauthentic. It's as if they thought, just throw in a naked woman, as if that makes something sexy or provocative or compelling. I just found it interesting because this is one of the first times where I've seen an ad and known why it was bad contextually rather than because I didn't care for the design. 

I wrote a poem

Ever since I've switched gears to focus and learn graphic design, my writing has been nearly non-existent, which is unfortunate because I'm trained in and love writing (particularly poetry). Well, I was watching a film and had some inspiration and I wrote a poem. ::Pat on the back::

This poem directly references the movie, but I'm curious how it works for those who haven't seen or don't know what the movie is... Special bonus points to you if you can guess the movie. I have a series of poems that do this, reinterpret visual cues into written words. I'm very interested in the connection between the two mediums-film and language.

But it's obvious how excited I am to be writing again, because I'm being so upfront in sharing a draft, that I undoubtedly will think is junk in three months. But I'd appreciate any critiquing, what you get and what you don't get, what works and what doesn't. A fresh perspective is always helpful, thanks.

::Warning, may include disturbing images--it was a violent movie::

The Wolf
For Lou Ellen and Carla Jean

i. A cowboy kills with precision.
A sheriff kills with a conscious.
The lobo kills.

ii. Have you ever watched
a deputy struggle to death—
kicking up shoe scuffs as if it was a dance?
Have you ever watched a handcuffed man
take away the breath of a peace keeping man,
the chain on the handcuffs
ripping paper cuts
across the flesh of his neck?

Would you talk to death before you die?
Would you put out your life story?
You don’t even know what you’re saying,
the wolf mocks you. You stammer,
who are you, what is that; you
try to blot out his voice—
a voice that throws you to your knees
praying it’s not the last thing you hear on earth—; you
wonder why there is suddenly
a trembling fear in your voice.
Not knowing what hits you
is a courtesy he gives you.

iii. The cowboy escapes his tango
with the wolf, and oozing wounds
make him brave which means foolish
and he turns the tables desperately
and goes on the hunt with a fury in his eyes
and a fire in his heart, but our hero dies too.
The legends of cowboys are just stories.

He sits where the man
who he is hunting sat when watching TV,
The sheriff chasing him
sits where the hunter sat watching his reflection.
The milk jar is sweating, a beaded ring
on the table—are you
hoping to catch him, or glad
you just missed him?
Do you die, veins full
of piss and vinegar, or do you retire
and fill your nights with desert dreams
of your deceased father?

iv. Arriving home in mourning you
set down your keys and you
pause at the open window and you
sigh and you know. You
nudge the bedroom door ajar with your finger tips—
his presence permeates
like poison gas billowing—you already know
he sits in the wicker rocking chair, still,
in the corner, as if he’s been waiting all this time for you
to come to him.

It's a Software Premier!

I watched this on ilovetypography.com. It's cheesy funny, but I love that the reviews are from xheight.com and ascender weekly, lol.


BraveFont from ilovetypography.com on Vimeo.

Week 4: Reading

This/Next week's reading had a lot of great stuff that focused on visual literacy. Some selections:

• Amnesty International's "Imagine" series p. 600-602
• Nick Hornby writing on Richard Billingham's photos p. 618-623
• Regarding the Pain of Others by Susan Sontag p. 652-656, although I'm not sure if this excerpt does justice to the book which is very thought-provoking
• p. 672, p. 673, John Kerry and Photo of the Year respectively

Standout: Frank Fournier's photograph of Omayra Sanchez, and corresponding essay by Isabel Allende and Interview with Fournier. I really appreciated the interview excerpt with Fournier, because like most other people, as he says, I wondered why the hell he wasn't helping her. Realizing that she was a goner by the time he got to her, mildly eases my discomfort regarding his judgement to photograph her.

I think it's interesting that the Chapter opens talking about Visual Literacy, and how in this age, "information, indeas and epistemology are given form by television, not by the printed word," according to Neil Postman. But I think the photo of Omayra relies on the words to tell the truth--I know that word is red flag. Really, I wasn't even sure what I was looking at when I first saw the photo, I knew something was wrong but had no real context. I gathered the information and ideas from the following texts. Although, we may be in an age of visual consumption, we can't assume that it wholly satisfying.

I'm also touched by the Fournier photo and interview and Allende's text because it makes me think of a plot point in the book: House of Leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski. For those who have read it, I'm thinking of Will Navidson and his photo of the girl (what is her name?!). For those of you haven't, read it, it is an amazing, chilling, challenging book, and should be of interest to any book designer purely because of it's form.

Week Off

Wow, it's a really great thing W&I isn't meeting this week.
With a slip of the hand, I deleted my entire "project 1: profile" folder. Ack. Sigh. So, I'll be spending a good few days redoing it. Thankfully, the project is already handed in. But I feel like I might still need it.

On another note... I'm also spending this week off from W&I figuring out what to do for project 3. I'm thinking on something about reading more/literacy. Or something from The Foundation for a Better Life, because I love this organization and their ads. They have about 30 different values to choose from, so I'm thinking about reading up and then choosing one... but I'm thinking that I might love them too much to redo it well. So, we'll see...

Show & Tell: Favorite Sentence

My favorite sentence comes from my favorite book, Nadja by Andre Breton.

She told me her name, the one she had chosen for herself: "Nadja, because in Russian it's the beginning of the word hope, and because it's only the beginning."

This is a great sentence because it has the same whimsical tone that the book does, that it is all just the beginning (Breton began the surrealist movement in writing.) He easily could have written, she told me her name was Nadja, she said it was the beginning of the word hope in Russian. Breton's sentence has rhythym. I heart this book. The premise is, a lot of rambling followed by about thirty pages of Breton meeting this woman Nadja in Paris (an actual account from his life) and the following few days they spend together going to cafes and such, again followed by more rambling. One of the major questions surrounding the book is, is Nadja real or did Breton make her up? Knowing this, makes this sentence doubly interesting because, is this the name she chose for herself or did Breton name her? I lean towards her being the subconscience of Breton.

Some runner ups:

Gradually, however, we are devoured by parents, gulped by schools, chewed up by peers, swallowed by social institutions, wolfed by bad habits, and gnawed by age; and by the time we have been digested, cow style, in those six stomachs, we emerge a single disgusting shade of brown. from Jitterbug Perfume by Tom Robbins

Although, I don't care for Robbins' books, I'm not sure why I don't like them, I am very aware that that man knows how to turn a sentence.

She was only the dead-leaf echo of the nymphet from long ago - but I loved her, this Lolita, pale and polluted and big with another man's child. from Adrian Lyne's film, "Lolita" based on Nabokov's novel of the same name

This movie quote is derived from multiple, long sentences in the book. I prefer this succint version. I love the description of a "dead-leaf echo."

Design for Democracy

I went to go see Marcia Lausen's talk entitled "Design for Democracy: Ballot and Election Design" at Towson University tonight. Although it was fast-paced, she covered a lot of interesting things.

Basically, she aided in the redesign of ballots and election materials in, so far, Chicago and Oregon. Lausen, along with an undergraduate graphic design class, an undergraduate industrial design class and election officials and committees took on the challenges of several problem areas, created solutions, designed materials, tested materials and are dispersing this information for free (AIGA Design for Democracy gives away A LOT of free materials regarding voting and the election). They gained increasing national attention and were showcased in several countries in Europe.

What I strongly appreciated is that Marcia Lausen isn't using this platform to pat herself on the back. She's advocating for the design profession. Working with people (election officials, government officials) who don't understand what design is or don't see the need for it, and making them understand that poor design has consequences (e.g. Florida in 2000) and that good design makes for more voter retention (she actually had a great chart on this) which ultimately serves to better our democracy. Likewise, she told officials that the jargon on the election ballot needed to be rewritten, and when they said no (for fears of being sued and what not), she asked them, do you even care about the voters? Audience!

Other really great things: apparently, there are laws about ballot design such as all names of candidates must be entirely capitalized. She had to go to court (?) and have this overturned, she convinced them that correct capitalization with lowercase letters is more easily distinguished than straight caps. She didn't know at the time that she should have been arguing for the grey background in the prototype too, apparently, that is also legally defined.

Lausen and her class overcame a lot of heirarchy of information problems by simplifying text sizes, weights and fonts. In addition, they created an overall identity for the materials: "red for instruction, blue for information" was a solid component. When voters recieved something in the mail 3 months before the election, it looked like the information given to them on the day of election. (Previously, voters would recieve a how-to brochure in the mail with 4 steps, and then on election day be given a how-to (for the same procedure) that had blown up into 11 steps and a completely different design.)

All and all, it was an interesting talk on a subject that I wouldn't have thought could be interesting. And it really provided a real life example for anyone who thinks design doesn't matter or is easy (Lausen worked on this project, and subsequent book, for eight years).

Week 2 Reading: Afterthoughts

So just a quick note on last week's readings:
In Sternfeld's series, p. 192-198, isn't it strange how there are no people? Particularly in a photograph of a tourist attraction (Mt. Rushmore) and in the middle of a thriving city (D.C.)? I wasn't sure what was making the images so effective in translating the tragedy, but I realize the omission of people feels very eerie. Surely, this was purposeful. Other things that enhance the images eeriness: the darkened windows in the grocery store that look like they're hiding something, the billboard that looks strangely heavenly amid rubble, and the way the bus stops glass reflects only slightly.

"Homeplace," page 210, was the story of a family whose house was blown over by a tornado multiple times and refused to leave. Sanders believes that they stayed because they "had invested so much of their lives in the land... it was a particular place, intimately known, worked on, dreamed over, cherished." I had lunch with a friend who just started law school and he set up a scenario that he was reading about on land-property-or-something-like-that-rights. If someone owns a piece of land, but does absolutely nothing with it for like twenty years, and some people come and squat on the land and build a house and take care of the property for like ten years... who rightfully owns the property? It turns out that laboring over the land (for some amount of time) actually gives you some rights to the property--he hadn't gotten to what those rights would be exactly, but it was interesting to know that the efforts of the "squatters" wouldn't be for nothing.

Show & Tell: Description, Part II

Oh, and I absolutely have to share this too, because I realize how well it fits.

William Carlos Williams is this great poet known for brevity and density in his writing. (He's the guy who wrote the poem about the plum in the ice box, which most of us had to read in high school.) He's describes with great precision.
And then there's, the painter, Charles Demuth, who I don't know much about. But I do know, that he painted a picture of one of Williams' poems, and I absolutely love it and it was one of the first pieces of art that I really liked and understood and felt touched by, and wasn't just told to like by some authority figure.

Here they are:

The Great Figure
Among the rain
and lights
I saw the figure 5
in gold
on a red
fire truck
moving
tense
unheeded
to gong clangs
siren howls
and wheels rumbling
through the dark city




Williams' poem is a description of a moment (among the rain and lights) and an object (figure 5 in gold, red firetruck). The verbs do a lot of work too: clangs, howls, rumbling. I think Demuth captures this poem in an abstract but visually descriptive way--the sizing of the 5 creates movement, the shadows on the edges are the dark city. And something I find humorous about this piece, Demuth put Williams' name and initials all over the painting, as if paying homage.

Show & Tell: Description

Excerpt from Elaine Scarry's The Body in Pain: The Making and Unmaking of the World.

What I found so fantastic about this book is that, Scarry's main point is to prove an argument, but she can't do that (well) without filling the book with descriptions because of the subject matter.

Most readers, don't understand what torture is, but through her clear descriptions it becomes more accessible to the reader, and thus her argument becomes more accessible.

She uses a lot of concrete nouns, verbs and senses, and I think the Solzhenitsyn example also enhances the description.

Week 2 Reading

Once again, here's a recap of my reading highlights.

• Eudora Welty excerpt from "Storekeeper, 1935" on page 161
• "Turn Left or Get Shot" photograph by Kerry J. Marshall on page 171
• Eric Lui's "The Chinatown Idea" on page 172
• Scott R. Sander's "Homeplace" on page 210
• Shawn Macomber's "The Chasm Between Grand and Great" on page 230

This week's gold star goes to Joel Sternfeld's "The Former Bryant's Grocery, Money, Mississippi." This is not the image I conjure up when I recall the tragedy of Emmit Till. If you don't know the history, I implore you to take a minute and read up on it. Although, I had read/learned the time and location of the murder, I obviously never pictured it right. In fact, when I thought about it, very little time was spent thinking about the place; instead, focusing on the events--"Bye, Baby," murder, acquittal. I never correctly imagined how rural it was, how very ordinary. It seems as if the place mattered very little, but in fact, this photograph makes me realize that it mattered so much. Because if Till was home in Chicago and had gone to a local corner store and said those doomed words, the consequences would have been different. Place can make all the difference.

On a different note, the chapter is called "coming to terms with place." I found a lot of the readings discussed what it means to occupy a space and what it means to occupy a place. Apparently, depending on the writer, the better situation can be place or space. But regardless of how they name it, it seems that they all agree that it is worse "to sightsee" (be mindless) and much better to do--canoe on a lake, build a home (again), or replenish the earth--in life. I happen to concur. I guess the "do" part--the work, action, creation, etc.--is what makes a house a home, makes wage into wealth, and makes life memorable.

Project 2: Hey, What's Up?

Project "Hey, What's up?" should really be called "Hey, What's Hot?" -- why, you ask? Because I'm doing infrared saunas! Haha. If you had asked me earlier today, I would have worked that joke into "confusing," "hard" and "stupid," depending on my then level of frustration, that perhaps some of you are still working through. Good luck.

As far as I can tell, there is news about infrared saunas in like the sauna-niche market, but so far no general/mainstream news articles (meaning, I googled it and the first 50 posts were not from the NYT, BBC, Cosmo, etc.). I found a magazine/blog article (it doesn't look like a very legit magazine), but it was posted this spring. So really, I feel like this constitutes new. And there's enough information that I'll be able to describe it, and a few pictures from companies selling them, so I'll be able to work with a graphic or two.

For those of you still killing yourselves over the topic, I think it's possible to get around the "new" part. If articles have been published about it--were they from an industry insider or a general news outlet? I feel like any articles on the inside are fair game. Because, like other people have suggested, how could we write about something new, if it was so new that nothing had been written on it. It's new to me, and it's going to be new to a large segment of the population--even those who keep abreast of the field that it's in, then I think that counts. Although, don't take my word for it, chances are I'll get a mysterious post from a professor stating that I am in fact, very wrong. Ha.