Project 2 — Form and Composition

Introduction: This project displayed how objects, in this case squares, can convey meaning through specific placement in relation to other objects and to the space around them. This is a simple project that builds understanding of Gestalt principals basic visual vocabulary. The goal of the final work is to exemplify Gestalt in that the whole composition will be more interesting than the parts individually as well as portray the word pairs they are illustrating.

Initial Thumbnail Sketches:

Digital ​​Iterations​​: I took at least two of my favorite thumbnail sketches from each word and created them digitally.

Feedback: During the desk critique I discovered that my clumsy and graceful compositions could be swapped in some cases. Robert felt that the precariously stacked large square on top of a small square displays graceful more than clumsy and vice versa for the composition portraying the person in a handstand. We also discussed that some of the pieces such as the fluid one that portrays a wave, may be almost working too hard to describe the word. The interpretations do not have to be as literal as making a water wave out of squares to depict fluid. Lastly in the figure/ground composition Robert suggested adding a square or something else in the empty white corner of the first one I drew to help with the flipping of white and black portions.

Further Itterations: I quickly decided I found my rhythmic/erratic and clumsy/graceful pairs to be better at portraying their meaning than my rigid/fluid ones, and therefor focused on those two word pairs. I took into consideration the feedback from the desk critique and ended up switching one of my original clumsy thumbnails to my final graceful composition. I also decided I wanted to use red as my one color in the compositions, because of its stark contrast to black. I thought that this would give the pieces more depth and I tried multiple ways of incorporating the color into each composition.

Final Piece:

Reflect: In working on this project I found that in portraying a word often more simple compositions worked better. I found myself overworking some of the pieces and then despite the fact that you could figure out what them stood for eventually, they did not portray the word as fully as some of the other competitions I saw at the final critique. Working with contrasting elements, such as in my final graceful composition, I found to be very powerful in a way I did not expect when I started this project.

In my next project I want to work on working through more itterations in which I try to simplify my original ideas. I feel this will help me get to the root of the design that works in communicating what I want. Then from the simplest version I think I can tweak it to find the best design.