There is always a research element in the daily\u00a0professional practice of the graphic designer.\u00a0After all, only analysis, study, reflection and\u00a0form research can lead to good design solutions.\u00a0But if you separate the research from\u00a0the commission situation, you come up against\u00a0the question of which subject is interesting\u00a0for further investigation.<\/p>\n
We were confronted by this question in the\u00a0Lectoraat Art & Public Space at the Gerrit\u00a0Rietveld Academie. We were looking for a\u00a0theme that not only matched the research area\u00a0of the group, but was also in line with our own\u00a0discipline and personal fascination. Our decision\u00a0to carry out research on the poster as a medium\u00a0was motived by two considerations.<\/p>\n
First, the poster is a graphic design product\u00a0that is distributed in the city in large numbers,\u00a0is constantly present, and plays a major role in\u00a0how we experience the public space. Posters\u00a0are a part of our visual culture and present\u00a0a large variety of designed messages with\u00a0which we are confronted every day. But is the\u00a0medium investigated and appreciated enough?<\/p>\n
Second, we find that the majority of posters,\u00a0with a few exceptions, are superficial in\u00a0terms of content and visual quality; they make\u00a0little appeal to the imagination and are only\u00a0too often interchangeable. Their form and\u00a0function often seem to be based on dominant\u00a0conventions and habitual patterns that are not\u00a0raised for discussion. As a result, there does\u00a0not appear to be any actual development.\u00a0Do we just accept this situation in which repetition,\u00a0familiarity and clich\u00e9s have become\u00a0stock in trade?<\/p>\n
We consider it important for this traditional\u00a0medium to be able to develop and for research\u00a0to be carried out on new possibilities and\u00a0applications. But the main question was: From\u00a0which perspective, with which material, and\u00a0with which method(s) of artistic research?<\/p>\n
MAPPING FIELDWORK In doing so we focused on the elementary\u00a0components of the poster: text, image,\u00a0colour and composition. Detached from the\u00a0original design, isolated and combined in new\u00a0arrangements, these components became the\u00a0Leitmotiv of an image. This makes it possible\u00a0to compare them and to shift the focus to\u00a0the form in which they are manifested. The\u00a0resulting images are visual data that do not\u00a0offer any direct, new solutions that can be\u00a0applied to the poster of the future. Moreover,\u00a0their value for us lies not in the outcome, but\u00a0just as much in the development of the different\u00a0working methods. Both give rise to a\u00a0renewed awareness, stimulate reflection, and\u00a0invite a reappraisal of the potential of this\u00a0fantastic medium.<\/p>\n In order to place this visual research within\u00a0a theoretical framework, we asked Jouke\u00a0Kleerebezem to join in our investigation. His\u00a0textual contribution reports on the various\u00a0stages, the questions and dilemmas with\u00a0which we had to struggle, the legibility of the\u00a0results, and the importance of artistic research\u00a0within the professional practice of the graphic\u00a0designer and academic art education. Jeroen\u00a0Boomgaard\u2019s introduction to the book places\u00a0the posters back in the space from which we\u00a0had detached them in order to investigate\u00a0them: the public domain where they belong.<\/p>\n
\n<\/span>First of all we started by mapping the properties\u00a0that can be relevant for the creation of\u00a0the design of a poster and how this poster can\u00a0be read and understood in the public space.\u00a0We linked these properties within a matrix to\u00a0eight questions that can lead to new insights. The matrix proved to be above\u00a0all a good discussion model for analysing posters\u00a0with related disciplines, but that did not\u00a0yield the desired result. The question arose of\u00a0how, from our discipline as graphic designers\u00a0with a strong urge to make meaningful images,\u00a0we might be able to take our research further.<\/p>\n
\n<\/span>A rigorous different approach was to go in\u00a0search of actual physical material. For three\u00a0months we collected all the posters that were\u00a0scattered through the city of Amsterdam: a\u00a0total of 523 different posters. By taking this\u00a0collection of posters from the public space\u00a0to the studio, we were able to consider it in\u00a0a completely different way. We left aside the\u00a0context in which each poster had been separately\u00a0developed and had functioned so that\u00a0we could isolate the material. That gave us\u00a0scope to work on a visual inquiry alongside\u00a0our professional practice in which we literally\u00a0cut straight through the posters in order to\u00a0dissect them in a later stage.<\/p>\n