VCT

VCT / Posters : Influence & Impact
Is the poster dead? An interesting VCT session with Monika. I didn't necessarily agree with everything she said, but she raised some good points and discussed some key issues. She showed us some excellent contextual examples and I liked the way she structured her talk (replicating her structure would be good a starting point for constructing my own VCT essay).

Monika talked about poster design over the last 120 years, finishing with present day examples and posing the question "what is the future for the format?". We started at the end of the 19th century looking at posters in Paris; then jumped to propoganda posters from WW1, contructivist Russia and the Vietnam war. This brought us to the 90's; we looked at David Tartakover (an Israeli nationalist and celebrated poster designer) and the Benetton adverts. We finished by looking at Shepard Fairey's Obama Hope posters, Troika and Aleksanda Macasev, and discussing how the format can be used to speak to people today.

Monika's talk focused on the poster as a medium for messages, as a vehicle for shouting your message. I believe in many cases the poster exists as something ornamental and decorative. Many posters are consumed for enjoyment and decoration, and they are designed in this way too. I feel this is a whole different side to the format which Monika didnt explore.

VCT / Printed Matter : Paper vs Cloth
This was a bizarre talk from Wendy! I thought that "Printed Matter" would be helpful with regards to my choice of posters...I thought maybe we would talk about substrates, inks and printing processes...I was wrong! We talked about cloth.

I have to say, I feel the link between cloth and printed matter is pretty tenuous. There were some useful concepts to take away from the talk such as taking inspiration from areas outside your subject area, looking at a broader contextual history than purely the history of design and challenging the medium of the format. However I left the lecture pretty confused and without having gained much new information on printed matter!