Western Gallery Window Decals
Prof: Brittany Schade
Design: Reese Murakami
The Task
I was tasked with designing a system of window decals that would be used in between exhibitions at the Western Gallery. After speaking with the gallery director, Hafthor Yngvason, I was given the parameters that the designs had to be type-based, the expense of the process should be kept in mind, and that the ideas couldn't diverge too far from WWU's brand guidelines (blue/white, sans-serif, etc.). With that in mind, I decided to keep all of the designs relatively simple and white.
Concept No.1 — Cascading Type
I wanted to explore the lighthearted side of typography and I treated the window-cube as a tank that was being filled with big, blocky letterforms. I wanted to give the illusion of gravity with the way that the letters are stacked on top of one another. The decals are striking from afar and encourage passing students to explore and look closer and find that I placed letters next to each other that spell out "western gallery" in multiple places. Another idea could be to make the letters in color and push the jubilance of the decals to the next level.
Concept No.2 — Hyphenated Quote
What better to go up on the fine arts building than quotes by a famous artist? I took a quote from Andrea Fraser, a performance artist who is known for her work in the area of instructional critique, and I hyphenated it to fit entirely on one side of the gallery windows. Because these decals will be applied between exhibitions, I thought it would be nice to have an option that transposable. The quote treatment could be applied to any quote and the only thing that would need to be considered is repetition based on quote length. Because this was an ideation, I didn't include the quote on both sides of the gallery window-cube.
Concept No.3 — Big Drama Type
This direction is a tongue-in-cheek nod to the fact that many students do not know that there is a Western Gallery or where it is. I remember being given a tour of WWU before I attended and the entire fine arts building where the gallery is located was glossed over as "art-classes that only art majors can take".
So I felt it necessary to be bold with the typography and dramatic with the word choice. "SEE ART HERE", "WOW ART WOW", and "WESTERN GALLERY!!!" would adorn the entrance and pique the curiosity of the passing students. I'm sure that they will know where the gallery is after that. I also made a version that extended over the doors to the gallery as well.
Back to the Sandbox: Art and Radical Pedagogy
I was also asked to provide decal ideas for the upcoming exhibition focused on the junctions of art and education featuring an artist named Luis Camnitzer. The parameters came from the artist himself and I was instructed to adhere directly to the brand guidelines of Western Washington University, to use creative restraint, and that this quote needed to be the focus of the decals.
The museum is a school.
The artist learns to communicate.
The public learns to make connections.
