Graphic Spaces

TERSTIEGE, Gerrit. 2009.

Graphic Spaces

Switzerland: Birkhäuser Verlag AG.

My love of this book started the moment I picked it up; even the front cover caught my imagination, with its uncoated paper and glossy screen-printed relief ink. Luckily I managed to get my hands on it when it was brand new to the library… no doubt its delightful tactility will soon be lost, as the library seals it in Fablon and students give it a good trashing.

Inspired, co-developed and designed by Catrin Altenbrandt and Adrian Niessler, award-winning partners of the acclaimed Pixelgarten Design Studio in Frankfurt, the book includes examples of works ranging from small-format still life to large installation. Terstiege sets the tone in the book’s preface by explaining that its theme is,

“…the transposition of messages into three-dimensional staged scenes.”
[pp 7.]

The book comprises a selection of 3D graphic works arranged under the following headings:
- Still life comes alive
- Intricate installations
- Touching type
- Thrilling animations.

As Terstiege describes in his preface, the collection comprises works from international, predominantly young, designers. To me, the collection has a sense of vigour and newness about it that reminds me of student shows or new designer collections. The designers featured in this book are clearly hungry to explore their creativity; the work is fresh, and often (but not always) is self-directed, without the incumbent limitations of a client brief.

Within the introduction for ‘1. Still life comes alive’, one quotation stands out as being something I have found myself fighting against. It reads,

“The computer has become established as a universal tool that not only serves as office and communication unit in one piece but also makes it possible to shorten the once elaborate path from sketch to final print. Despite all these freedoms, the variety of computer programs is limited to preprogrammed options. In other words, the field of virtual options limits the design experiments to a delineated terrain.”
[MUCKLE, Sophie, 2009. ‘Still life comes alive’. In Gerrit Terstiege [Ed.] Graphic Spaces. Switzerland: Birkhäuser Verlag AG, pp. 26]

By contrast, Muckle observes that works like those included within this book allow designers,

“…to emerge from behind their computer monitors and desks, sometimes even leaving their offices. The blank screen or white sheet of paper is replaced by a space which, be it empty or occupied, now awaits tangible intervention with new design methods.” [pp. 26]

However, in Muckle's introduction to the second section, ‘2. Intricate installations’, she does point out that,

“There is no doubt that experimentation serves to further develop design standards, methods, and ways of seeing. It is important to remember, moreover, that the global exchange of ideas and digital networking serve as catalysts for this evolution. Although the computer does not play a superordinate role as a design tool in this evolution, it nevertheless enables young designers to develop a new and different idea of self.” [pp. 81]

Here is a selection of example projects taken from the book:

Multistorey developed these graphic elements for the second Super Design Market event at the Royal Festival Hall, as part of the London Design Festival. [pp. 160-161]

This piece by Benoit Lemoine uses layered sheets of coloured paper on the wall and floor. [pp. 127]

By the Dutch design studio Underware. Shopping trolleys were arranged to spell the words "Dream on". [pp. 172-173]

Self-initiated work by Valerie Sietzy. When light falls on the walls, reflectors reveal words and drawings under a highway bridge.

'Backbreaker type', created by Kalle Mattsson. I particularly like the way that the wind is turned into a prop or medium in order to create the letterforms. [pp. 131]

Self-initiated work by Florian Jenett. With letters constructed from clock-hands, a legible sentence is formed for just sixty seconds, after which a full twelve hours must pass before order is once again momentarily restored. [pp. 145]

Illusionism / Dimensionalism

In the second chapter of Graphic Spaces, entitled ‘Illusionism Meets Dimensionalism’, Steven Heller considers how visual trickery, or ‘illusionism’, from early to mid-twentieth century (citing surrealism, expressionism and Dadaism as examples) has developed over the years. [HELLER, Steven. 2009. ‘Illusionism meets dimensionalism’, In Gerrit Terstiege [Ed.] Graphic Spaces. Switzerland: Birkhäuser Verlag AG, pp. 11-15]

With the birth of new technologies in print, photography and computer-aided design, this created what he describes as “dimensional illusion multiplied”. Selected quotations from his text are as follows:

“…design illusionism…has to do with deceiving the savvy among us into perceiving that two dimensions are really three.” [pp. 11]

“…creating the illusion of three dimensions in two-dimensional space has long been one of the graphic designer’s foremost – and probably most enjoyable – challenges.” [pp. 11]

“[In the mid-nineteenth century] types with large, massive, colourful shadows and other faux sculptural elements were commonly used on store signs or display windows to suggest dimensionality and drawn the eye to the focal point of attention.” [pp. 11]

“When [the Bauhaus master László Moholy-Nagy] conceived his three-dimensional cover for 14 Bauhausbücher, where he composed type on a piece of clear plastic and photographed both the type and its shadow falling on the surface behind it, his goal was to literally add another dimension to how graphic design was employed and perceived. Moholy sought to liberate type and typography, images and imagery, from the strictures of two dimensions, even if in reality the result was still stuck on the two-dimensional printed page.” [pp. 12]

“By the late 1930s, model-making had also become a major element in the designer’s toolkit. Building structures – large and small – that were photographed and often collaged or montaged to create new realities was so common that a genre called ‘three-dimensional illustration’ emerged.” [pp. 12]

He cites Peter Blake’s cover for the Beatles’ Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band as one of a number of major milestones from the forties to the sixties, that altered the standards and rules of dimensional design.

Heller considers dimensionalism as a spin-off movement from illusionism. He concludes his chapter thus,

“Even now, when the computer has made dimensional design, and therefore dimensionalism, so easy, the method still evokes a sense of wonder. But it is not the virtual images, but the handmade artefacts that continue to evoke the most wonder. The handmade method that makes objects seem to have volume, weight, and mass has the power to titillate the eye and mind. The designers who make these illusions are doubtless challenging the perceptions of their audiences, but they are also accomplishing what Meret Opphenheim may have had in mind when she first conceived her iconic ‘Fur Cup’: she made us look! Illusionism or dimensionalism – whatever it is officially or unofficially called – is the art forcing a second, maybe even a third look – and that’s what every designer wants to achieve.” [pp. 15]

Simply Droog

RAMAKERS, Renny. 2004.
Simply Droog: 10+1 years of creating innovation and discussion
Amsterdam: Droog.

This book appeared on the reading list for a group seminar looking at design ethnography. A retrospective of the work of Droog at the time of writing, it includes a series of short essays covering topics which explore the guiding principles of the Dutch design collective. Some of these principles have been consciously nurtured by Droog from the outset; others have evolved or solidified over time.

Extracts from the book most relevant to my work, or which I found particularly intriguing or thought-provoking, can be found below...

RAMAKERS, Renny & BAKKER, Gijs. ‘Introduction’, pp. 4.

“The activities of Droog Design have grown tremendously in the past years. We make exhibitions, we give lectures, we initiate experimental projects, we carry out commissions for companies and organizations, we produce and distribute products, we publish books, we supervise the IM Masters course at the Design Academy in Eindhoven and we have a shop cum gallery in Amsterdam.”

BETSKY, Aaron. ‘Re: Droog’, pp. 15-16.

“The core belief of Droog Design seemed to be that design was not a question if making more objects, using more materials, or even inventing new ideas or solutions to the problems we encounter in our daily lives, but one of finding more ways to experience, explore and expand the possibilities of existing objects, images, spaces and ideas. Like squatters in the history of art or the structures of mass production, they hunkered down with what they had inherited, scavenged, salvaged and maybe even stolen, turning it into communal artefacts. For that is what they did make that was new: a community. Droog is a kind of design tribe.”

WILLIAMS, Gareth. ‘Use it again’, pp. 28.

“Similar ideas lie behind Gijs Bakker’s Peepshow wallpaper that features a cut design allowing spots of the old paper underneath to show through. It regulates and heightens our perception of an older product. Rather [than] sublimating or replacing the past, history and memory are used again as core conceptual elements of the new design.”

KONINGS & BEY, 1997/99. 'Kokon furniture'. Pp 29. & 136.

These pieces were created by coating existing furniture in PVS. By wrapping the pieces together, the shape (and the perception and familiarity of it) is changed to create new and hybrid furniture pieces. I particularly like the way that the coating accentuates the new form and draws my attention to the three-dimensional form that define the bound-together pieces.

BEY, Jurgen. 2003. 'St. Petersburg Chair'. Design Boom. Available at: http://www.designboom.com/snapshots/milan04/droog.html [Accessed 21/09/2009].

Again using existing chairs, coated with foam and glass reinforced Polyester and silk-screened with a floral pattern. These were developed for the Dutch Room in St. Petersburg. I particularly like the way in which a new uniformity is achieved to previously non-matching, non-uniform chairs.

SCHOUWENBURG, Louise. ‘Inevitable ornament’, pp. 73.

“According to Jongerius, for whom decoration would become more and more important in her work, it’s mainly the small detail that stick in our minds. ‘We remember the patterns of the wallpaper in the bedroom or the stripes on the coffee cup that we held every day. Forms disappear from memory but decoration lingers.’ It seems that conceptual design and decoration are very compatible, as long as the underlying idea gives rise to it.”

HEIJDENS, Simon, 2003. 'Sugar cubes numbered 1-200'. Pp. 80.

There is something charming in the seemingly pointless simplicity of this piece. Sugar cubes are individually numbered using chocolate print. The chocolate print and board box complement each other superbly and the overall effect is one of supreme graphical order.

VAN HINTE, Ed. ‘Irony’, p. 102.

“A designer can use his creations to transfer meaning, but there is always the intriguing risk that the observer misunderstands. This can happen in two slightly tragic ways. The first kind is when a more often than not inexperienced designer, without any hidden agenda, creates something straightforward that nevertheless seems to suggest much more. Consequently observers perceive layers of meaning that were never supposed to arise. The result can be that the work of this designer has an inspirational quality that others have yet to explain to her or him.

The second is just the opposite: a designer may have attempted to express something that later is misinterpreted or not understood at all.”

The text goes on to explain,

“…Droog design was perceived as presenting ironic alternatives for a more sustainable society, especially in the beginning when many of the products incorporated used materials and familiar shapes. The designers, however, had different considerations, based mainly on aesthetics. Since irony presupposes a certain amount of knowledge, the clues offered work differently for different
audiences.”

VAN HINTE, Ed. ‘Experience’, pp. 121-129.

This essay talks about the rise of experience as part of the design outcome. It considers brand experience – how brands are no longer just symbols representing consumption but have become artificially linked to experiences that consumers can undergo. It notes that experience design has become a discipline in itself.

“The implications all depend on the way in which experience is defined. Generally it is a set of consecutive visual, but sometimes also auditive and tactile perceptions that are so memorable that it becomes a fixed association in people’s minds, whenever part of the same circumstances occur.”

“…experience is about memory.”

FARKACHE, Nina. 2001. 'Bench "Come a little bit closer" ', Nina Farkache, 2001. Pp 127.

A playful piece constructed from stainless steel, glass marbles and lacquered MDF, this bench has seats which 'float' on marbles allowing sitters to roll their seat over the marbles to move together or away from each other.

Kvadrat's new Shoreditch showroom

Danish textile company Kvadrat appointed graphic designer Peter Saville and architect David Adjaye to work together on the design of their new Shoreditch showroom which opens this month (March 2009). A 7m high space, it comprises mezzanine offices and a lower-ground retail space. The focal point is this multi-coloured glass staircase linking the space together, offset by an otherwise neutral palette of grey, black and white.

When I first read about the project in Design Week, I was immediately drawn to the simplicity of the design and its firmly graphic approach. Here is an example of spatial design undertaken in part by a graphic designer, which somehow retains the feel of two-dimensional graphic design whilst at the same time fulfilling a spatial design brief. Together, Saville and Adjaye have used colour and geometry in the same way a designer might approach the design of a piece of printed artwork. Indeed on reading the article, Saville says that his back catalogue of graphic design work played a part in forming the concept - in particular, the colour coded alphabet on his Blue Monday single cover.

Interestingly, Saville's take on the role of space as a communication tool in its own right closely follows my own view of the links between branding, communication and spatial design. He has been working with Kvadrat for nearly five years, principally as a communications consultant, and believes his involvement in the current project was a natural progression of that role. He says,

"Everything within the context of how an organisation acts is part of how it communicates. The London showroom is a significant dimension of Kvadrat's communications and, as such, the company was interested in my contributing to the aura of the new showroom."

(LORENZ, Trish, 2009. 'Double Act'. Design Week, 24(10), pp. 19)

Second image from: Rose Etherington, 2009. 'Kvadrat showroom by Peter Saville and David Adjaye'. Dezeen. Available at: http://www.dezeen.com/2009/03/20/kvadrat-showroom-by-peter-saville-and-david-adjaye/ [accessed 20/04/09]

Droga5’s Puma projection

Posted on the CR blog a few days ago, this is a great new ad for Puma, from Droga5 in New York. It uses a fascinating combination of choreography, spatial design and projection techniques to show a couple’s journey through life.

'Droga5’s Puma projection and more nice work'. CR BLOG, Centaur. Available at: http://www.creativereview.co.uk/crblog/droga5s-puma-projection-and-more-nice-work/ [accessed 19/03/09]

Inspired

By Giovanna Forte

"Three simple things inspire on a daily basis. The second is my Brompton bicycle. It transports me effortlessly and with dignity across London and beyond. It is beautiful, compact and elegant. The third is my Chanel No 5. The clean graphics, the Modernist bottle and the way the top makes a satisfying and feminine 'click' when replaced. Sublime on every level. Neither could be improved upon. This is good design at work.

But let's look at the more generic number one. The first sight which, on opening my wardrobe in the morning, gives me a frisson of pleasure is the evenly spaced regiment of identical hangers that keep my clothes perfectly placed, perfectly creased, perfectly hung. The blissful repetition of
sensuous, stainless steel curves that sit lightly on the rail, reflecting the morning light with even, perfectly positioned stars. Each a gleaming crescent of metal that slopes gently into a black, rubber-covered horizontal, from which my clothes hang so naturally.

The satisfaction of visual and sartorial order and balance is a simple pleasure, derived from an elegantly crafted, utilitarian yet decadently sexy storage accessory. Someone, somewhere designed it. Whoever you are, wherever you are - thank you."

FORTE, Giovanna. 2009. 'Inspired'. Design Week, 24(10), pp 10.

Manifesto

These images are of the work I produced in response to the Manifesto Poster design brief.

My intention was to explore both two and three-dimensional composition. Within this, I wanted to retain a clear visual link between the pieces, underpinned with a strong graphic style. I also wanted to explore both making and experimentation so as to add another layer of personal meaning and relevance to my MA.

A spatial element was introduced to the posters through cuts and folds, with the audience needing to move around in order to read the full text.

The plywood slot-together letterforms, spelling ‘branding’, ‘communication’ and ‘spatial design’, were extracted from the poster text and used the same font (FontSmith's Pele Two) as on the posters. This font was chosen not only since it lends itself well to the slot-together approach, but also because it is an up-to-date and fashionable font amongst the Graphic Design community. This enabled me to suggest a link between my previous work as a graphic designer and the new ground I will be covering through my MA studies.

I was particularly pleased with the outcome of the printing experiments I carried out. I found that, by printing on the reverse of silver card and then cutting and folding the vertical slots, it became possible to see the reflection of the text on the reverse, in these folds. The overall effect was to give an illusion of the text floating just behind the surface of the poster. This added a layer of spatial complexity to the poster. It is also in keeping with a key aim of mine over the coming months - to bring making and experimentation forward in my process so that it becomes more formative in my work.

Images clockwise from top left:
1. Manifesto posters
2. Close-up of poster constructed using silver card
3. Branding, Communication & Spatial Design
4. Close-up of slot-together letterforms