anika mari

For Graphic Design there are 2 things you need: purpose and tools.

There can be many purposes including, but not at all limited to: expression of an idea, better sales for a company, a strong identity, providing information, lending context to images or to a project, directing thoughts or actions, and organizing content.

Tools are many and varied, also including but not limited to: color, pattern, movement, layout, concept, sketching, ideas, photography, text, grids, planning, research, movement, hierarchy, talent, creativity, inspiration, repetition, balance and texture.

So for the specific poster, I chose from each category.
Purpose: to provide context
Tools: text and texture

The next layer is that I chose photos with different textures to illustrate one of the tools, texture. The word “contexture” reminded me of the “before & after” category on wheel of fortune, which inspired the type treatment, or text of the poster.

As yet, I have not provided the context. I purposefully kept it off the actual poster to prove the point that without context it’s just a pretty picture or design, but not successful in delivering the message, or fulfilling the goal that might exist.

So the the context:
I chose textures from images that I have taken both in the Baltimore/MD/DC area, and also in Mexico City where I am currently living. About half are photos I took while living in MD and about half are taken here in Mexico, but without that information, one would likely not realize that as the case. Without context, any of the photos could be from either location.

When you boil it down, there are always the same visual elements in any environment, though perhaps they are arranged quite differently, providing the context for the specific place/city where you find them. Textures and patterns and words are arranged in a uniquely Mexican way. When I walk out the door, I know I’m in Mexico City. The letters on signs are arranged into Spanish words, walls are brightly colored in every hue you can imagine, traffic is crammed bumper to bumper in the narrow lanes, bright green VW Beetle taxis swarm the streets. Cement mixers are decorated with highly colorful, stylized snakes and flowers. In Maryland there is space; lots of space and trees and nature, and cars speed down country roads. In Baltimore City, there are fewer trees than the countryside, but there aren’t as many people bustling to and fro as in Mexico. Traffic might be tight, but not crammed. Signs are in English, colors are more subdued. Cement mixers are gray or silver or white, or some other reasonable solid shade.

In each different environment, there are visual cues that make them unique, but if one looks closer, and closer, and closer still, the similarities can stand out among the differences.