In class this week, we teamed up in groups of 4 to produce any positive word that’s collaged by previously printed material. (Magazines, newspaper, etc)
For our group, we’ve decided to choose a 4 letter word so we could spilt the work evenly (one letter for each person). We only spent 15 minutes on this activity but I made more in my own time as Andy suggested my E looked almost too forced.
Overall, I really enjoy working as a group because it is interesting to see different outcomes and styles put together. This helped my thinking in the sense that when I was looking through the magazines, I was only focused on finding models to work with. Therefore, this made me look back onto our first project on looking out for existing objects and manipulating them (eg: rotate, resize).
(Please Keep Reading)
My own extended Collage activity for ‘LOVE’
Reworked 1
Working alone allowed me to overlap the letters easily giving it a cohesion within the piece. I believe that all letters has at least 1 underlying strength.
L - Utilising it’s size. I really like how I opted for using text to represent the ‘L’ as it was the letter I struggled the most with in this specific composition.
O - Using its original form. How the black inside the block represents the space within the ‘O’
V - Rotation.
E - Cutting out only the pieces that stood out such as the mother’s hand on the child and the shoe to represent she’s sitting with her smiling.
Reworked 2
Going to the end of the second activity, I felt like I had a good idea on what to look for. This time I wanted to not think too hard on looking for the letterforms and just let my eyes guide me as I flip through the pages.
L - Taken from the inside of a building. Really like the slight gradual enlargement towards the end.
O - I was impressed with this because it was another technique of collaging as I’ve ignored the shape of the fire and followed my own cutting line.
V - The shadow and the girl made the exact space to form a V, thought I was a genius at this point.. (sarcasm)
E - Struggled to find this E and ended up using the same format as I did in class.
Overall thoughts...
It was fun to pick and choose which image to use, I especially enjoyed it more when it was time pressured (like in class). This is because I felt like as if it was harder for me to work with so much options and time on my hand (interestingly enough). Though, I definitely did not enjoy the cleaning process after this activity. :’)
What a long documentary that was. However, I have to say it was pretty cool to see it's origins and now how far it has come. I never really noticed it before but now I see it everywhere, it’s funny how that happens.
Decided to go on a little hunt around the house to find examples. It’s featured on such a variety of objects, I found it on skincare bottles, clothing labels, my laptop, the fridge, the Bunnings logo, the tv and on hair products. Coincidentally all the photos fall into a colour scheme of red, black, white and silver. Kinda an aesthetic, go me, even though it was unintentional.
It’s going to be hard to not automatically think that’s Helvetica! when I see the font now, design student tingsss.
A voice sounded from my ear... "Please use everything you have to make up your name." by one of my lecturers.
I was stunned for a while, and then I reacted because I do n’t have much stuff today. It ’s the easiest stationery to make up the English alphabet but I only brought a pen...I noticed that my classmates come out with stationery, cards and other things that can make the alphabets. However, I was distressingly searching for what else was in my bag, and I found that the laptop charger might be a great choice.
After several practices, the design of "Mia" was finally completed (Photo 1 attached). Although the laptop charger has become the main core of the letter, adding the mouse seems to add a little creativity to the whole effect, and it will not be so boring. At the same time, I also used several receipts to create another type of font (Photo 2 attached). In contrast, I prefer the design of the first idea because the charger is more challenging.
This fun and challenging activity prepared me for the next tasks in advance to accept the challenges from my teachers. This activity also started my design adventure!!!
The Memphis-filled apartment of Raquel Cayre. Photo: Bobby Doherty/New York Magazine
1986
Pee-wee’s Playhouse debuts. The spirit of the Memphis style (though not necessarily the philosophy) enters the mainstream. The movie Ruthless People, drenched in Memphis-inspired décor, comes out that year, too.
October 1991
Karl Lagerfeld, who filled his Monaco home with Memphis furniture, sells his entire collection at Sotheby’s.
February 2016
Supreme releases an apparel-and-skate-deck collection designed by Alessandro Mendini, who exhibited in the first Memphis show.
Schwartzberg L. (2017). The Memphis Design Movement Is Having a Moment. Retrieved from https://www.thecut.com/2017/05/the-memphis-design-movement-is-having-a-moment.html
Ooooooh boy. What a week it has been. I’m slightly sleep deprived and super overwhelmed by how much work I still need to do.
In the meantime, here’s the progress!
Also, it was honestly so hard to choose between my 1st and 2nd creative - I love them both! However, I’m currently focusing more on Sean Kirkpatrick (Second creative) with this project as he’s from Melbourne (Soft spot for our hometown)
I plan on doing one for Artbymoga (First creative) as a side thing though!
MOCK-UP 1: Its...okay.
This is my first mockup print out and it turned out fine! I realised that it might be a bit small..
I also realised that as much as this zine is perfectly fine, I’m not satisfied with it’s ‘lack’ of expressing my creative to the full potential. I might make it more like a comic to reflect his style!!
Mock-up/prototype 2: Better! ...Needs some adjustments + additional surprises hehe
So much happier with this layout! It reflects my creative’s style and colour palette really well! I might play around with negative space & some text adjustments
Now time to create all of the small not-so-secret additions such as the pull tabs, pop ups etc.
This was created in illustrator btw, found it it was easier to do the pages because i wasn’t doing a normal traditional zine
(Sorry InDesign, its not you , its me)
Also happy with the size of the zine! Yayy
Generative design is a revolutionary new method of creating artwork, models and animations from sets of rules, or algorithms.
Cedric Kiefer and Julia Laub are the creators behind the book Generative Gestaltung; and founders of Onformative, a studio of digital art and design based in Berlin. Their work is focused on driving past the boundaries of design by using alternate mediums like coding, lights, music and even dancing. They explain that they deal with topics that interest them, such as scientific subjects and topics based on nature and current issues.Their process is very open and experimental, first they look at the topic and what they want to express with it and then they choose the medium to express it.
The book »Generative Gestaltung« deals with the creation of images by using codes. An image is no more created manually but through a visual idea which is translated into a set of rules and then implemented in a programming language in the form of source code. The consequence is that such a program can not only create a single image but also completely re-design visual worlds by changing the parameters.
- Onformative
The fact that Cedric and Julia studied communication design and are now the authors of a book that has become one of the key reference works on generative design inspires me as a comm design student to look beyond simple design solutions and explore more processes to express my creative ideas.
Full article: https://www.freundevonfreunden.com/workplaces/cedric-kiefer-julia-laub/
When coming into this course, some of my person objectives were to learn a bit more about the history of design and to continue designing and expanding my skills through a range of different methods and media’s. I can say confidently that with each lecture I learnt more and more about all the introductions and movements throughout the history of design, I also feel within the workshops in this course I was able to learn new many new techniques to help with ‘pushing my design until it breaks’.
While I found many of the movements we looked at in the lectures such as the early print stuff like Gutenberg’s influence and the bold, exotic work done by the Memphis group in the 80s, I was most intrigued by the influence of the Bauhaus and its impact on how art and design is taught.
Throughout the semester I also really enjoyed the hands-on nature of the classes and the time we got to explore, think and create freely with a range of different materials and methods in groups. In particular I feel as though the collage making and prototyping really and helped me expand my ideas and I also loved learning my about zines and in the future, I aim to explore print design even more.
