Sometimes my instructions for a project are more explicit than others. Duke told me to do something with the name of the night – “Crystallize” – that had some sort of connection to the elements of a supersaturated solution. Or something. So I went back to the well, and drew upon my love for Time Life reference books for inspiration. In that sense, I’ve made this poster many times over. It’s just never looked like this.
I’ve long had a fascination with words and the aesthetic appeal of blocks of type. And what designer isn’t mesmerized by type? So it was fun to use text bodies as pictorial elements, and since I can resist adding layers of meaning (even if no one will ever see it), I sought out or created copy that had some relevance.
The poster is going to be printed in full color, but the handbills are one-sided black and white. On some other projects, that might have worried me a little, but if there’s one thing I love it’s a nice, poorly reproduced black and white flier made on a beaten and battered copy machine. For the sake of the final result, I hope the printing goes very, very poorly, and that someone has to hand cut the 4-ups.