Graphic designer and typographer Stefan Sagmeister has always had a unique way of viewing the world, therefore has created designs that are both inventive and controversial. He is an Austrian designer, who works in New York but draws his design inspiration while traveling all over the world. While a sense of humor consistently appears in his designs as a frequent motif, Sagmeister is nonetheless very serious about his work. He has created projects in the most diverse and extreme of ways as a form of expression. This report will analyse three of Stefan’s most influential designs, including the motives and messages behind each piece.
On September 13 in Waagdragerhof Square in Amsterdam, Stefan and his team began a major project for the eyes of the public. The coin project was inspired by the appearance of the stone plates covering the plaza floors. What took eight days, and the help of many volunteers came one of Sagmeister’s most influential works in society. Sagmeister created a design/plan for this large-scale area; collected 250,000 Euro cents sorted into four different colours, and carefully placed them over this 300-m2 area according to the master plan. This quote reads: “Obsessions make my life worse and my work better” - Stefan. The use of calligraphy and modern
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He uses extreme methods to attract attention to his artwork and in doing so, challenged the social norms. In his early life, Sagmeister had been keeping a running list of life-learnings in a diary titled ‘Things I Have Learned In My Life So Far’. Eventually, he translated these private thoughts into a series of typographic artworks and public installations that shocked society, exploring everything from obsession, confidence and love; the list of quotes was influenced by the personal experiences he gained throughout his life. However, the hidden message behind these works was left open for
Nicolas D. Kristof’s account of history has an undertone of projection bias. He assumes that people will have the same outlook on Admiral Zheng He’s voyages under the Yongle Emperor as he. He makes a reference to China viewing Great Britain as being a “backwards region” and doesn’t explain why (as if the reader will incoherently agree). He disregards European goods of wood, beads and wine, as if they are worthless. He expresses that China could have easily bypassed Africa and explored further west. He states that China had architecturally advanced vessels; the naval ships were massive and the designs were very luxurious. Kristof believes that China, with its vast fleet, skillful navigation, and thousands of personnel should have made it to
“When I began to do titles many, many years ago – the dark ages, when designers lived in caves – I went through a very intense learning experience with some extraordinary film makers,” Saul Bass – 1996 As a graphic designer, I like to look at other designers work and analyze their style. It helps me in my own work to see what others are doing and how they’re doing it. One designer who has really influenced me and whose work I love is Saul Bass. He was a master of presenting and communicating things in such a different and interesting new way. He has an iconic and unique style that really had an impact without being over the top. I definitely try to emulate what he does in a lot my work and keep things simple but still want them to have that same impact that his art did.
Bell, Clive. The Aesthetic Hypothesis. Aesthetics. Edited by Susan Feagin and Patrick Maynard. New York: Oxford University Press, 2010.
Oswald Spengler (29 May 1880 – 8 May 1936) is a pessimistic German historian and philosopher, who equals or surpass Nietzsche in his own time. He propounded a new perspective for evolving cultures as a whole to explain the history of the world, which then challenged the contemporary idea of linear history. Generally, the philosophy of linear history is really a powerful assumption for people and this is very much influenced by Christianity in a way and still survived in post-Christian West. There is this common perception that we are the next step in history and this history leads to greater freedom by means of liberation, understanding, and technology. Although it is true that there are bad events throughout the journey, however that just like speed bumps to the Utopia. For example, the standpoint of technology apparently seems true to this perception, which is from medicine to automobile and communication; they all are slowly paved toward perfection. In Spengler’s cosmology of history, human cultures and civilizations very much like mythology of plant life, where they grow and dies. Great culture also can come into an end, decaying.
Carson is a designer whose unorthodox graphic style played a major role in his success in the design world. His sense of typography is original and unique in a way that he does not follow the basis of communication design. For example, his arrangement of text is not what we would normally see which is in order but positioned in disarray creating chaos and confusion which is new and refreshing. His use of interesting visual simultaneously with typography creates an out of the ordinary design where sometimes the images are deliberately obscuring the text that goes with it and occasionally creating an unfinished sentence or word.
Some may ask why do we design? What actually makes our design work? When a designer can produce effortlessly the goal of design has been achieved. This is a universal principle and is not limited to neither digital media, handcraft nor with any other design method. Within today’s era, typography has come a long way in regards to its development and the technologies used for it. Aside from this things are still developing, however, some things will always remain the same. “Words in art are words. Letters in art are letters. Writing in art is writing” – Ad Reinhardt (1966) (Morley 2007: p6)
Like most people, typography is a focus in graphic design that most people overlook or don’t think anything of. Even though it’s seen every single day in multiple ways, people still forget that it’s considered an art of its own. Every single day we see typeface in multiple ways. Typography is one of the most influential art forms out in the world to date yet somehow it goes unnoticed. Max Miedinger, Adrian Frutiger, John Baskerville, and Matthew Carter are some of the most influential and famous photographers in history. Max Miedinger, the creator of “Helvetica”, (one of the most admired fonts) changed the world of typography / typeface.
This marked the beginning of his inspiration to form a personal, expressive, and religious stance on his art values and style. He has found his process and content that will be apparent in his future work.
Rene Magritte was an enigmatic and strange man who painted surrealism paintings. Little is known about his childhood except that his mother, Regine Magritte took her own life by drowning herself in the Sambre river. Young Magritte is thought to have discovered her body floating with her night garment covering her face. There is speculation that this trauma was an influence on many of Magritte’s works. When Rene Magritte took up his brushes, he created beautiful visual riddles that delight and bewilder the viewer. His clean lines and highly detailed finishes made his brush strokes nearly invisible; his paintings look as if they came from a printing press. Magritte referred to his paintings as “his labors.” He did labor over the paintings and the questions and answers that spawned them in his imagination. His art poses questions, seeks answers, and challenges the conventional definition of ideas. He came to the surrealist style of art in the 1920’s and has produced some of the most beautiful and moving art in the world. He was a shy and introverted man who loathed the social familiarity that society imposed on its celebrities. He liked to maintain social boundaries and was rather reclusive, ironically, he routinely used people as objects and removed the boundaries of association between objects to create his visual riddles. He did not like to be recognized and that came to be one of the running themes in his works. Always the enigmatic secret agent man, Magritte is as much a riddle as his paintings.
Globalization accompanies with the localization. People often read design via their recognitions of visual signals. By creating a more humanistic approach to visual design, a global design consisting of localization, graphic signal, research, marketing, and both linguistic and semiotic communication to breakdown the global code of design (Jones, 2011).
Artists in the Modern period illustrated the existential idea of individuality through visual imagery to convey the power of man and the fallacious influence of the external world. For instance, M.C. Escher’s noteworthy piece, Hand with Reflecting Sphere, epitomizes the idea of self-derived identity. The message of the piece revolves around the idea that when searching for meaning, one should look within. Specifically, this is seen in the imagery of the reflecting sphere, for as Escher gazes into the sphere to discover his purpose, he simply sees himself. Moreover, the artistic element of depth amplifies the effect as the highlighted image is the one of the author, further illustrating how, at a primal level, the one unwavering source of meaning is the spirit of the person itself. In addition, M.C. Escher implements the aesthetic quality of contrast, by overlaying the detailed reflection on top of an unrefined background. Furthermore, this bolsters the message, as the importance of reflection is shown to be greater than the mundane outside
When I saw Vermeer's Girl with a Pearl Earring about five years ago at the National Gallery in Washington, D.C., I felt something about the painting that I had never felt before when looking at artwork. I felt as if this girl, this young woman in the painting was real, hiding in the museum behind this canvas. She was in the flesh. Her skin was still dewy from three hundred-something years ago, the light across her face still glowing. She was in the round, her eyes followed mine, she was real. She was about to speak, she was in a moment of thought, she was in reflection. This girl was not crimson red or titanium white, she was flesh. Vermeer caught her, a butterfly in his hand. She was not just recorded on canvas, she was created on canvas. She was caught in a moment of stillness. Vermeer creates moments in his paintings. When viewing them, we step into a private, intimate setting, a story. Always, everything is quiet and calm. I realize now it is no wonder I had such a strong reaction to Vermeer the first time I saw him: he is a stillness seeker.
Hegeman, J. (2008). The Thinking Behind Design. Master Thesis submitted to the school of design, Carngie Mellon University. Retrieved from: http://jamin.org/portfolio/thesis-paper/thinking-behind-design.pdf.
“In a decaying society, art, if it is truthful, must also reflect decay. Moreover, unless it wants to break faith with its social function, art must show the world as changeable. And help to change it.” This quote by Ernst Fischer, a German composer, means that truth in art exposes the parts of society, and of life, that no one wants to see. In order for art to change society, it must first reflect the fears and failures of its people. The artist can change how people think of themselves and the world by using less conventional methods of creating art. The artist, in doing this, introduces new ideas of human placement in time and space, new frontiers of thought, that are furthered by the disciplines of science and philosophy. The artist works to introduces unique- and sometimes offensive- ideas so that society will be exposed to new ways of thinking and understanding the world. The artist does this through experimentation with color, style, and form. Therefore, the purpose of the artist should be to challenge how individuals perceive themselves and the offensive aspects of society reflected in art to bring about innovations in the greater society.
‘You cannot hold a design in your hand. It is not a thing. It is a process. A system. A way of thinking.’ Bob Gill, Graphic Design as a Second Language.