Formal Analysis Of Hiroshima Post Poster

Hiroshima Poster Formal Analysis (Assignment one)

Notation “Hiroshima: Panels by Iri Maruki and Toshiko Akamatsu” Is a poster which was designed in 1957, by Wim Crouwel for the Stedelijk Museum in the Netherlands. The poster was for a museum exhibition on specific works of art related to the Hiroshima bombing in 1945. Being a museum exhibition poster, it would have been mass produced for many locations and environments, so it would have used offset printing in A3 or A2 sizes.

Perception

The poster uses a portrait format, which is common for posters intended to inform as it is a more natural reading orientation. It contains a vivid red background with bold, thinly spaced, Black lettering across the centre. Laid horizontally below the lettering is a brief description of the exhibition in white text. The same style and alignment of text is used at the top of the page to show the museum presenting the exhibition. Two compact, rectangular pieces of white text to the right of centre are laid above and below the main lettering, to deliver the times and dates of the exhibition. The design is highly abstract, and almost exclusively makes use of type to build the design, forgoing shapes or images. The typography

The design was intended to attract and inform viewers of the poster to a museum exhibition on works of art relating to the Hiroshima bombing in 1945. Specifically, the works being presented were that of Iri Maruki and Toshiko Akamatsu, Japanese artists depicting the horror and fear encapsulated in the event. The original works were created in 1950, and were of course topical and had a degree of fear residing outside the work, due to the “fear of action by the US authorities”. (The Hiroshima Panels, 1966). It is clear then that the poster was intended to be provocative and highly contextualised, while also being informative and drawing