Univers : projets étudiants

How does architecture reflect the process of a country’s urbanization? How does urbanization influence the development of architecture? With these two questions, in the special case of China, this book will observe and discuss an abnormal architectural phenomenon—the “duplitecture” phenomenon in which entire townships appear to have been airlifted from their historic and geographic foundations in Europe and the Americas and spot-welded to Chinese cities. This phenomenon will then be utilized as a magnifying lens to reflect the process of urbanization in the New China and to question the future of the “Chinese Dream.”

Culture comes from a group of humans, and at the core of every human is their consciousness. Through our consciousness as humans, we perceive the world through sensation and our experience defines who we are and where we belong to. Therefore, I introduce shapes that evoke that sensation and five categories that define intangible culture into the visual system of Intangible Cultural Heritage (ICH). The selected shapes are driven from the visual language that originally appears on ancient pottery. The dynamic visual identity of this project breaks the stereotypical image of the current out-of-date model. This sends a new message to the public that ICH will adopt the most advanced technology to document intangible culture from all aspects. With a dynamic typeface and ever-changing logo, the visual identity system is representative of the way various cultures change, evolve, and mix together.

(TITLE) NON-PLACE is based on the theory of non-places, coined by the French anthropologist Marc Augé. The idea behind the book was that places and non-places exist—there isn’t a space that can be just a “place” or a “non-place.” The book is divided into two sections: the “physical non-place” and the “digital non-place,” showing places and non-places coexisting in the physical and digital space. Typefaces, colors, and other design decisions were deliberately made to reflect the loss of identity in a non-place.

Tippet Rise Art Center is an intersection where art, music, land, sky, and poetry can weave together into an algorithm that is greater than the sum of its parts. Music isn’t about notes any more than poetry is about words. Notes and words and the angles of a sculpture are just the shadows of the essences that hide behind them. Every landscape is a work of the mind shaped by the memories and obsessions of its observers. With Tippet Rise, I am hoping to provide a branding on the land where these transfers of energy and knowledge can take place. Typeface Designer: Kenneth Kuh.

The neutral yet detailed design reflects the publication’s diverse content without distracting from it. To achieve the high quality that the subtle design requires, great care is taken with the selection of materials and techniques employed. Neobond is used for the dust jacket, Bristol card stock for the cover; both are screen printed. The wrapped color fabric indicates the content and connects everything. The other main design element is the typographic treatment.

The project was album packaging with a randomly assigned music genre and art movement; I was paired with Ambient and Brutalism. As a huge fan of ambient music, I didn’t think twice about designing the cover for the cult classic Watering a Flower by Haruomi Hosono, an odd and mysterious collection of two ambient tracks. Inspired by the hard-edged and raw aesthetics of Brutalist architecture, the project was interesting to design because it involves something rooted in nature. The two motifs on the back and front depict the Water(ing) and the Flower. The belly band features custom typography derived from these minimal motifs. Typeface Designers: Rohan Rege, David Jonathan Ross.

This was a series of posters for a bouncy ball competition.

Spector Press is settled squarely in the intersection of art, theory, and design. Based in Leipzig, Germany, this publisher explores the possibilities offered by an active exchange among all parties involved in the book production process: artists, authors, book designers, lithographers, printers, and bookbinders. The identity of the publisher was inspired by the idea of spectator. As a book publisher, Spector Press acts as a spectator in the intersection of art, theory, and design by capturing different perspectives. A circle of the letter “o” from “Spector” was used to emphasize the role of a spectator by simplifying the idea of spotlight.