This is a poster was done by Roman Cieslewicz for Vertigo in 1963. It is one of my more favorite pieces of design work that I found in the book. This poster is so fascinating and genius because of the way he went about using text and different images to bring a new one into play. When you first look at this piece you see a dead man with a target on his head, but with further examining you can clearly make out the different elements that create this dominate image on the page. I also like the fact that he placed the rest of the text tword the top of the page to sort of balance out the white space. All around I think it is an amazingly unique piece and is definately inspiring to designers.

This was a poster done by Henry K. Tomaszewski in 1964 for the play Marie and Napoleon. I chose to write about this piece because I think it is simply atrocious. If I was the the person who told this designer I wanted a poster for my play and he came back to me with this I would have to ask 'Are you kidding me?' I'm not sure if its the head of a doll looking figure with wings randomly floating around on the plain white page or if its the objects that are randomly placed around and beside one another or if it is the text that he used to write the name of the play at the top, but I find this to be horribly dreadful. It almost feels as though he went into a childs playroom and found some scraps of paper, a couple crayons and a head of a doll that had been ripped off of a body and place them all on a piece of paper and called it art. I feel like this is almost poking fun at designers in general and is almost offensive to me. People do not realize all the time and effort that goes into designing anything and then Mr. Henry here goes and presents a piece in which looks like this and it almost feels as if its saying so easy a child could design...

Black Square

Ultimately I had to say something about this piece of work. When I saw this in our book for the first time I thought it was a joke. I could not believe that someone actually called this giant geometric object real design or art. I could not see past what it truly was, which is just a black square. Then I thought about it for a bit and after questioning why the designer thought this was ok, I realized something. This giant black square may be the design, but you have to look past the design into your feelings and mind. It is not about what the object is or the color, it is about what could lie beyond this or what could even be inside this deep darkness. I ultimately decided I actually like the concept behind the piece, whether I just made it up or it was intended by the artist I think it could open doors to others minds as well.

Harper's Magazine-July Edition

This is just one of many of Harper's magazine covers that was featured in our book. I chose this one, however, because it is my favorite. The initial design of the cover is fairly simple, yet is very appealing. I like how there is not outrageous color or pattern and I also think the text is appropriate and readable. Also, the fact that they used images of firecrackers to create the text JULY is just so very clever and that is another reason I like it so much. The fact that the girl on the cover is lighting the fireworks while reading the magazine is great because its almost saying hey, you're probably going to enjoy you're 4th of july, but not as much as you will reading this magazine.

Packaging

Wood Type Movie

First of all, I want to say that before we even watched this movie I figured it was going to be dry and boring, however it was not. It definitely surprised me at how interesting and even inspiring it was. This is an art form that I would love to be introduced to for two simple reasons: One, because it is an old art, I find it so fascinating to be able to be connected personally with history and two, because it looks like it would be so much fun producing work in this manner and seeing how much different it compares to what we do now on computers. Doing hands-on art almost makes us feel so much more proud of what we have accomplished and gives us so much happiness. I would love to be able to design this way and also even go to the Museum in Wisconsin. I find it so sad that they have such little funding. I want this to be something people realize is out there and is a huge part of our history. I want them most of all to appreciate and see the beauty in wood type as I see it. To be able to go to the museum and not only look, but touch history is so amazing and inspiring. If I had the chance to learn the art of wood type I would jump on the offer in an instant as would many others in our class I predict. I feel it should be brought back to life again and we should use this to our advantage not only in our design work, but to promote the beauty, history, and the creators of our past.

Week 2

Identity

This poster is done by Theo van Doesburg and Kurt Schwitters in 1922. It is called "Kleine Dada Soiree" and was part of the Dadaism movement.

The Art

The poster was created to make people knowledgeable of the Dadaism movement and it was called the Dada show in which it was produced for. The two men went throughout Holland introducing and promoting the new art movement which favored " irrationality, chance, and offense to good taste."

Audience

The audience was anyone and everyone, however Doesburg and Schwitters made their way throughout Holland with the information of this movement with the poster only.

Intended Audience

The audience they probably wanted to affect was artists, like themselves, people interested in buying their work, and anyone who would understand and appreciate what they were trying to portary through this movement.

The Core message

I believe the core message of this piece was mainly to embrace a new type of art and instead of portraying everything as beautiful and perfect, to look at the other side of the spectrum and see something new.

Wanted Outcome

The wanted outcome of this whole poster and excapade was most likely to not only spread of the word of the Dadism movement, but to get their names and work out to move people as well.

Design

The design of this piece if definately something alot of people were not used to in this time period and I credit them greatly for spreading the word of the movement and this type of art. It says you don't always need images for art to be interesting and well.. art!