Australian designer Mark Gowing explains that the repeating forms of his country’s minimalist landscape are manifested in his geometric compositions. This poster was designed to advertise a solo exhibition of the work of Jonathan Jones, a Sydney-based Aboriginal artist from the Kamilaroi/Wiradjuri nations located in South Eastern Australia. Jones’s work in sculpture and installation features fluorescent tubes and incandescent bulbs, often arranged in patterns that have their origins in the Kamilaroi/Wiradjuri traditions. His exhibition at Sherman Contemporary Art Foundation, untitled (the tyranny of distance), showcased a piece with fluorescent lights enclosed in a blue tarpaulin. For the poster, Gowing adopted the colors, light, and shade of Jones’s artwork and created a typeface that echoes the angular lines of the fluorescent tubes.
Caitlin Condell is the Assistant Curator in the Department of Drawings, Prints & Graphic Design at Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum.
The exhibition How Posters Work is currently on view at Cooper Hewitt through November 15, 2015. You can learn more at the exhibition homepage and find the book How Posters Work at SHOP Cooper Hewitt. #HowPostersWork
