Poland for a Uruguayan
Poland for a Uruguayan is a different country and without doubt an exotic destination. Poland for a Uruguayan designer interested in poster design is a marvel.
Marvel:
To show or experience great surprise or admiration.
–Cambridge Dictionary
Poland is worthy of being admired for its elegance and simplicity, qualities that are evident in every aspect of Polish culture, but as every baker sees the world through bread, every designer sees the world through design.
The first thing that caught my attention is the use of white space. In Warsaw, breathing feels great thanks to sidewalk that is accompanied with trees and for the pronounced width of the streets.
Of the seven wonders of the ancient world only the pyramids are known. My mind always played to imagine how the Hanging Gardens of Babylon would look like until I met the Warsaw University Library, place where the Social Poster Exhibition was held. The exterior of the building is extraordinary. The interior is has a large patio of cobblestones lined with vegetation walls.
The vernissage was attended by the entire diplomatic corps of Latin America, representatives of international organizations, teachers and students.
The exhibition aims to achieve in the public a reflection on the different issues that are present in the Human Rights agenda. It’s an invitation to think about the topics addressed in a different way, using image and typography applied to a poster.
Once the activity was over, I looked at a collection of posters that were for sale. What started as simple looks ended up being an exercise.
Exercise:
an action or actions intended to improve something or make something happen.
–Cambridge Dictionary
Leaving this phenomenal place was easy compared to choosing which poster to take home. Which message will my wall shout every day?
After a first approach to the city and its people it was time to start interacting with future Polish designers.
The workshop begins with a presentation of my work where I first define myself as a person and then as a designer:
What it is to be Uruguayan?
What does it mean to be Jewish?
What is design?
The way in which something is planned and made.
–Cambridge Dictionary
What is good design?
I like design to be visually powerful, intellectually elegant and above all timeless.
–Massimo Vignelli
Why I design the way I design?
One day I was appreciating Müller-Brockmann’s posters when I wondered why his posters work so well. The answer was found when analyzing the poster “Less noise”. I rotated the poster 45º to eliminate the diagonals produced by the image and the copy, then I compared it with the original. Josef was a master of semiotics. The double diagonal transmits negativity as in the no parking sign. By eliminating this the poster stops working. This finding became my approach to design.
On my side I was excited for the cultural exchange, to find the differences and similarities of human behavior and especially to discover their way of facing a blank sheet of paper.
It can be said that the Polish people are expressionist. Expressionists defended a more personal and intuitive art, where the interior vision of the artist predominated: his expression. Expressionism is usually understood as the deformation of reality to express nature and human beings in a more subjective way, granting greater hierarchy to the expression of feelings rather than to the objective description of reality.
Throughout its history, the Polish society withstood the pressure of various cultures that sought to implement their way. This causes their feelings to not be expressed without a sense of insecurity that makes them believe that it’s better not to show what they feel since someone may not like it and could challenge my thinking against the authority.
Then the following happens, the Polish designer feels comfortable facing a blank sheet and bursts, he forgets his environment to concentrate on the space that the blank sheet offers.
The technique chosen to build the posters is colored paper cut with scissors. This method has as main objective to make the students not feel scared of not knowing how to draw. It’s easier to cut than to draw or at least they see it that way.
The farewell of the Akademia ended with a gift, generosity of Piotr Kulbicki, a professor at the University. It happens that when I entered his office I fall in love with a poster, I enthusiastically told him that it’s the best poster I’ve seen in a long time, without hesitation he picked it up and gave it to me. The poster was designed by a school student whose name couldn’t be find.
Among the charming corners of Warsaw
There is a peculiar street, Ulica Profesorska. Its buildings were designed and inhabited by the professors of the University of Technology, hence its name.
It’s entered through a forged door, on which there’s a renewed sign from before the war with the name of the street. Behind the door begin the stairs that runs almost half of the narrow street that is only one block long.
The level of Polish graphic design is high, in general and in particular there’s a special care for graphics. By this I mean that there is no bad design and the average is high. For example, it took me four days to find Arial in the streets.
Walking through Warsaw I found a street that was identified with four street name signs. The style of each sign indicates an era, when Poland was part of the Soviet Union, before the war, after the war and today. Ulica Próżna is a historic street as it’s the only street of the old Warsaw Ghetto that still has houses.
I’m a simple man, I see the flag of my country, I give a like
In Poland the same super glue is used as in Uruguay. I don’t know how or why, but our super glue reached borders never imagined or at least for me. It’s not that I doubt its quality, it’s that I can’t help wondering how ‘la gotita’ or ‘Kropelka’ flew so far.
Łódź thanks to Agnieszka Ziemiszewska
A few years ago, Agnieszka and I started exchanging emails showing our latest works, so meeting a colleague which I admire for her approach to design was going to be captivating.
We met personally a few days before my talk at her class at the Polish Japanese Academy of Technology in Warsaw, but Agnieszka is from Łódź.
We enjoyed my last day in Poland at her city where we visited a fascinating place: The Book Art Museum. The name perfectly describes the essence of the place where homage is paid to the editorial piece par excellence, the book.
They make paper, teach how to bind, rescue typographies and matrices to re-melt in lead, print on Linotype, large-size cylinder printers or minervas. They do everything. To be honest, the only thing they don’t produce is the ink with which they print, just to get an idea.
Brygada 1918 is a digital revival project of Brygada typeface done thanks to the matrices found by Janusz Paweł Tryzno at the museum.
The remarkable thing about traveling is that we always come back with more. How nice it’s to travel and how nice it’s to return home. Full eyes, happy heart. Thanks Poland for everything you shared.
Home:
The house, apartment, etc. where you live, especially with your family.
–Cambridge Dictionary
