50 THINGS - Design decisions - Draft Ideas

Personality

Museum archive aesthetic. Self curated exhibition of personal collection. Look at Hans Sloan Collection, Henry Christy collection. Look at design of museum collection maps and exhibition materials. Objects isolated or grouped depending on classification. Look at use of photography and use of written language.

Grid & Structure

This will be largely dictated by the type of classification that I choose. What will be important in any case is that the objects are the main visual focus of the poster. They will need to have their own adequate space to sit in and likewise any accompanying text will need to be clear and legible. As this poster will at minimum be featuring 100 separate elements (50 images and 50 accompanying captions) I will need to look at a grid structure for the page that allows for this.

Hierarchy & Order of Read

I am going to use my museum research to inform my decision on the order that the individual objects are displayed. However the over-all hierarchy of the composition needs to ensure that the photographs of the objects take priority. They need to form one collective visual that encapsulates a snapshot of me in objects. Thinking about it purely in numbers I would want it to be ½ photographic  1/4 descriptive text and 1/4 accompanying text (eg title, credits etc.) 

Colour function

Based on my museum research, colour does play a role in the exhibition of artefacts. In order for objects to speak for themselves they are often removed from their natural surroundings and placed within neutral surroundings. Black, white and grey are often used to isolate the individual objects so that eye is not distracted by anything else. However collections that are themed will often appear in minimally decorated areas. They are still displayed in fairly environments but a room or particular display may have an identity chosen by the curator for a particular reason. Each object in the archives is given a specific code indicating it’s department, acquisition date and collection number. I could possible use colour as a secondary way to classify my objects.

Typography

In the exhibition and archiving of objects, clarity is very important. This is an information design project and the information associated with the objects needs to be clear. I will need to bear in mind when I am making any typographic decisions that I have decided that the images will be the focus of the poster and the text will come second. I think that for this reason I will keep my typographic choices to fonts that emphasise clarity and function rather than decorative ones.