OUGD601 - Forms of Abstraction in Contemporary Design

Cover Design - Erik Carter - In this design, abstraction takes form through the use of scanning. This method is popular in contemporary graphic design culture, as it produces highly unique results. It has been equated with experimental typography. To an extent, the use of a scanner is experimental, but it's hardly radical. It doesn't challenge the structures of typography, it just distorts them, playing with notions of legibility in the process. This use of abstraction is fairly basic, but it does produce diverse and visually exciting results. This aesthetic would be conventionally be achieved through the use of a scanner or photocopier. In the current moment, this effect can be achieved through digital manipulation using the liquify tool in Photoshop. This approach to abstracting type through distortion is inextricably linked to postmodernism. Members of deconstructivist movement in America and the UK pioneered this aesthetic ithroughout the 80s and 90s. It has since been disseminated across the world and is popular in amateur and commercial sectors of the discipline alike. 

'Misker Festival Identity 2012' - Studio Fuzz - this identity work unashamedly uses abstraction in the form of 'scanned type'. The decision behind its use appears to be purely aesthetical, as it doesn't seem to any offer conceptual meaning. It would seem that the overall design treatment was chosen as it seemed trendy, thus aligning itself to a category on Trendlist. 

Darren Oorloff - This designer utilises abstraction as a devise across the work they produce. In the album cover design for Sluggers 'Anthem EP', Oorloff has severely distorted the typography, achieving a highly fragmented overall aesthetic. The deconstructivist movement in the 1980's has either consciously or subconsciously influenced the practice of this designer, as all of the characterises of deconstruction are plain to see in his work. In this instance, abstraction appears to have been used for purely aesthetic reasons. 

‘Turn chaos into control’ – Collaboration between Ned Karlovich and HORT Berlin– Here the distortion of the typography is used as visual metaphor. By presumably 'scanning in' the typography, the designers have produced an aesthetic which communicates the literal message of the words through semiotic play. In this context, abstraction has been used to imply further meaning rather than remove it. This form of abstraction is distinctly Postmodern, as it has intentions of ambiguity and subversion. 

'Lost in Konglish Zine' - Ran Park - 2016 - Konglish is the use of English words, or words derived from English words, in a Korean context. This simple premise was the concept behind Berlin-based designer Ran Park’s zine, Lost In Konglish. “The inspiration is a little bit whimsical,” explains the designer. “One day, I heard a gentleman explaining to a foreign tourist what a ‘banana’ was called in Korean. Phonetically it was the same, which made me think of the subtle alterations in the Korean language over the past decades.”The publication shows the words that are phonetically pronounced the same alongside the Korean and English letter forms. 

The layouts are chaotic, the words smeared across the pages. The use of abstraction here appears to be conceptual as well as aesthetically. The content of the publication is concerned with chaos and confusion, therefore it is appropriate that the aesthetic is distorted and visually chaotic. Here, abstraction is audaciously used: it hasn't necessarily been utilised to solve a problem, if anything is exacerbates it. Under Modernism, abstraction was employed to reduce form to its most minimal state, and in the process, remove any cultural, conceptual or political ambiguity. Here, abstraction is used deliberately to achieve a sense of ambiguity. 

Scanned aesthetic: A lot of these designs fall under the Trendlist category of 'scanned'. This effect can be achieved simply through scanning in something visual and manipulating whilst it is being scanned. The results are always unique and have become synonymous with visual experimentation and play. Scanning emerged from the Punk and Grunge movements, where a deconstructed, distressed aesthetic was favoured in order to represent feelings of anarchy and disruption to social order. Before the scanner became widely accessible tool, people would usually use cut and paste methods to achieve similar levels of abstraction. These approaches evidently had a profound impact on graphic design practice and culture, reflected in the work of these designers operating in the current moment. 

Minimalist abstraction: Abstraction was a key device of negation for the early protagonists of Modernism. Reducing a visual element to its simplest form allowed the designer to negate politics and social convention, through removing the need for conviction. Modernists favoured bold geometric shapes and sans serifs as they were pure abstractions of previously complex, ornate forms. Modernism was a radical rejection of the old approach. In order to communicate to the newly modern world, Modernist graphic design placed great faith in the aesthetic of the machine and new technology, translating its efficiency and functionalist qualities in simple visual elements. This approach to the notion of abstraction had a fundamental impact on the discipline, many modernist devices of abstraction are still active in graphic design culture today. 

Hans Gremmen, Alexander Kluge, Poster for OCA, Office for Contemporary Art Norway, 2014 - In this poster, abstraction is happening blatantly, but its use is not as abrasive as the use of scanning or liquefying. In this particular design, a Modernist approach to abstraction is taking place. Use of circles, a form favoured throughout Modernist graphic design, abstracts the typography in a way that still allows the audience to understand the information. The legibility of the type is relatively high. Designs that employ scanning techniques often push legibility to their upper limits, causing the type to become virtually unreadable. 

Sarah Boris Poster Design 2015 - This poster embodies a distinct modernist approach to abstraction. The visual elements, the sun and waves, have been radically reduced to their most minimal form - this pure abstraction is derived from the early modernist ventures in art, architecture and design. The simple use of geometric shapes and lines represent huge things in reality, but have been completely simplified to flat signs.