OUGD601 - Dissertation Research - Deconstructing Binaries

My theme in which my dissertation explores is one of contemporary issues. I am basically assessing the legitimacy of modernism and postmodernism as key components within contemporary graphic design culture. I am examining them in order to attempt an understanding of the condition we are experiencing in the current moment. 


I came across the fascinating work of graphic designer Vanja Golubovic whilst visiting Berlin in March 2016. It immediately caught my eye and has obviously stuck with me until now, as I suddenly remembered how relevant her poster designs for Tresor (an infamously edgy nightclub in Berlin) are to my current lines of enquiry. 

Personal analysis of overall design treatment:These designs are important: they are a blatant display of the attitudes of a contemporary designer who has adopted a definitively mixed approach to the traditional conventions. To me, certain modernist design principles, passed down from the Bauhaus and International style are evident within the work. The most obvious device present here is of course: the grid. Grids are inextricably linked with modernist graphic design. Protagonists of the modernist movement with Europe, such as Josef Muller-Brockmann, favoured the grid as it brought essential structure and functionality to their work. Modernists indicate that the grid is a tool for thought, and should be used to systematise, to clarify and to reduce content to its essentials. This reverence for the grid gave way to the ideology of 'form following function', a theme which is still adopted by many practising designers today.



What I find intriguing in these posters is the visual emphasis that is placed on the grid. Golubovic has deliberately made the logical structure of the grid visible to the audience, putting a thick stroke weight on it, setting it in a contrasting colour to the background. The simultaneously brings order and chaos, in the sense that the grid is actually dissecting other elements within the composition. 

At the top of all the posters, you will observe deliberate strike-through's, classic components of deconstructivist design. What is interesting here, is that are being employed to serve a function. The act of erasure, or striking out, can add new, unintended meanings to the images and information that lie below

Talk about crossing out of the dates - linking to deconstruction - Poyner?

Characteristics that could be viewed as being modernist? Certain typefaces used, however, there are several typefaces being used here which is a nod to postmodern influence. Collage has been used, again a subtle nod to deconstruction and eclectic aesthetics associated with postmodern graphic design culture.