Matthew Carter's Walker
MoMA has just acquired 23 digital typefaces for its Architecture and Design Collection. Some are of everyday use, like Verdana; others are familiar characters in our world, like Gotham, which was used in President Obama’s election campaign, or OCR-A, which we can find at the bottom of any product’s bar code; and others are still less common, but exquisitely resonant, like Walker or Template Gothic.
If you’ve followed this blog for a while, you may already have the sense that a lot of people are involved in putting together an exhibition. Curators, preparators, conservators, exhibition designers, registrars, security, and others all have critical roles to play in what you see at the Museum. But what happens when you take the same approach when putting together an exhibition app?
Tomasz Sarnecki. Solidarność (Solidarity). 1989
I was raised on Westerns—The Rifleman, Hondo, Wyatt Earp, Cheyenne, and Lawman, with plenty of John Ford and Sergio Leone thrown in, and I just adored those cowboys.
Rising Currents exhibition entrance.The exhibition's graphic design was made to appear similar to blueprints, the mode of graphic communication among architects and builders. Photo: Jason Mandella
Rising Currents: Projects for New York’s Waterfront is a unique exhibition for its subject matter, but also because of the process of putting together the exhibition. As graphic designers, it was heartwarming to have the full support of both the curator and the exhibition designer throughout the entire process. We were particularly gratified to be given the opportunity to take take our creativity beyond the title wall and into the individual displays—yeah!
I find that the process of many design jobs is a journey between two extremes, both of which are usually to be avoided, but if you strike the right balance, you end up in some interesting places. Finding the graphic identity for the exhibition Counter Space: Design and the Modern Kitchen</a> was a classic example.
Alexander (Sándor) Bortnyik. Ma VII - IK (Grafikai) Kiállitása. 1919
While we always believe in the works we propose for addition to the MoMA collection, some works stand apart in extraordinarily strong ways. They speak to us because of their great historical significance, aesthetic power or, in my case with the above poster, because of true love.
The yellow shapes are movable magnets, which can be repositioned to fit into the small forest scene at bottom right. Photo by Michael Nagle
When we first met with the educators from MoMA’s Education Department to discuss the Shape Lab installation, we knew instantly that this project had to be FUN for us, the designers—and that FUN needed to be part of the design for the visitors.
Shape Lab is an interactive educational space for families. The educators’ intention for this space is to encourage visitors to interact with the space and explore the different ways artists use shapes in painting and sculpture. The space was filled with interactive tools and furniture, educational toys, art books, and shape learning activities. The original project request was to design an identity for its title wall. Instead, we designed a multifunctional activity wall, which both communicates its message and functions as a fun learning game.
Three-dimensional rendering of the entrance to Tim Burton (left) by TwoSeven, Inc., based on an untitled drawing (right) by Tim Burton for the unrealized project Trick or Treat (1980)
Tim Burton was one of the most challenging exhibitions our graphic design department has had the pleasure of fully developing. It explores a wide spectrum of Tim Burton’s creative work, including drawings, paintings, photographs, moving images, concept art, storyboards, puppets, maquettes, costumes, and cinematic ephemera. For the exhibition graphic design, our goal was to take all these diverse visual references and distill them into a simple graphic treatment that celebrated Burton’s work.
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