Harvard GSD Public Program: Spring 2020
Result
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Regardless of the fact that graphic design is considered a single plane practice, any project takes up time and time happens in space as a fourth dimension (x, y, z + time). GSD commissioned a project for a time-based document from us, given that it should communicate a series of events that would happen over a determined period of time. Beyond its design, it became the documentation and archive of something that happened, wherein the dates, times, places and people involved made up the contents that justified the project. Our proposal was very simple, practical and functional.
The first thing we did was to take a step back from the traditional idea of a poster saturated with images and information, putting aside formal and aesthetic decisions until later. Our starting point then focused on the production and printing techniques. Designing with this premise in mind, our goal was to create visually attractive solutions from a technical point of view. We represented the general passing of time and then erased the “dead” time, where nothing occurred. However, that space that we call “negative” in graphic design terms, also happens, and it is as important as the time in which things actually happen. These dead times become spaces for reflection that allow us to process the information. That is why we found it so important to depict the timeline as something that is impossible to break, whether an event takes place or not. This allowed us to work in layers and structure the contents according to their immovable position in time.
In this case, we designed an invisible grid that would indicate what exists and cannot be modified: time—months, days and hours—which is interrupted by a small hand-drawn clock. This would remain in its corresponding position in all the applications, and was printed in reverse on the backside of the paper as a first layer. In the front, as the other layer of time, the GSD seasonal program was printed according to and overlapping with the fixed months, days and hours. In using all the spaces available on the paper (front and back), and because of the translucent option that we selected, we had the opportunity of creating a visual effect in several dimensions, so the original idea, thought of in a single plane and from a digital window, could be successfully transferred to physical reality and become space itself. Working with a translucent material also allowed the poster to stand out among the others, while in a visually cluttered space; its transparency became an act of respect in which the posters behind it were always visible.
