VOID
2015 Design BFA Thesis Exhibition
Design cannot be properly understood in a gallery space because it is void of context. We have chosen to forgo displaying our physical projects in order to call attention to the complexities and nuances of the design process itself. The typographic walls describe each designer’s cognitive process, while an accompanying catalog illustrates the corresponding project’s imagery. This division still does not provide the ideal context for our work, but instead further points to the fallacy in detaching design from its life in the real world.
Catalogue
We deconstructed each project into image and text, the images were found in the accompanying catalogue while the text was displayed on the gallery walls. Each of the projects displayed were divided into categories: objects, social, print, branding, mobile applications and multimedia. The catalogues accompanying the gallery space mirrored the black and white walls which delineated the change of one category to the next. In following with our curatorial statement, we wanted to show the disconnect between the gallery space and the intended space for the designed object, rather than the work itself.
Text
We sought to create an experience in which the visitor would want to interact within the static space. We erected two walls within the preexisting gallery space to create a natural flow for the visitor to follow. The text for each project loosely followed a character limit and writing guideline leaving room for the individuality of the designer to come through.
We then divided the statements into three levels of intimacy, the first being an individual level, the second being something involving two to three people, while the third level being something a community would take part in. These levels determined the size of the type installed in the gallery. The different sized statements were intended to subtly and subconsciously guide the viewer to move in and step back from the statements depending on the size.
We used Lineto’s Brown as our typeface, using it’s black-slant to identify key words in each statement. The statements were cut and installed in vinyl by the cohort over the period of a week. The curatorial statement was presented in an interactive installation that revealed the exhibition concept when people were present in the gallery space.