Poetic design
When designers are working with text, they are often working with types and not as much with the form of the text. Many modern writers, on the other hand, are working intensively with the text form, though they are not concerned with types – and neither with visual aesthetics. So, perhaps there is a room for mutual inspiration?
One example is the author Per Højholt. This weekend I fell over the collected poems of Højholt. Actually, it was published a year ago, but this weekend was the first time I noticed it.
One of Højholts famous poems looks like this:
Each line in the poem says: ”solen se dens vældige horn mælken fryser i sin karton” (the sun see its immense horn the milk is freezing in its box), but the letters are placed on top of each other in a staggered arrangement. Hereby the text is a form which depth changes depending on how you view it. Hereby Højholt violates a central writing rule, i.e. that letters must follow each other successively, and by deforming the language this way the poem is actually emphasizing that rule.
The poems of Højholt made me think of another author, Simon Grotrian. He has written the peculiar and concretistic poem “Svaner set gennem tårer” (Swans seen through tears):
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Well, admitted! Neither Højholt nor Grotrians solutions are very pretty, and as writers they are probably more interested in literature than in visual aesthetics.
But perhaps one or two of their ideas can be applicated for some design solutions?
Below is a small example, where I think it is done carefully and with success.
The stage play Kærlighedshistorier (Love stories) on the theatre Aveny-T is presented on this site. On the screen shot above the (red coloured) title Kærlighedshistorier forms a rectangular box. The box ends out in/behind the red shirt of the female artist on the bottom of the site.
The theatre name and logo to the left is placed in a 90-degree angle, and the lower arms of the female artist are rotated the same way, while the upper arms are positioned perpendicular to this general line.
And furthermore the text AVENY-T forms an arrow as a part of the company logo to the left.
This way the text angle and form is in harmony with the overall layout - without the text just being placed in squared boxes.
As seen below, this is a general design-line on the theatres website.
And on the front page it gets even better. Here the text in the coloured hearts is rotated and stresses the somewhat “nervous” layout.
Additionally the logo is moved to the upper right corner, and forms a line with the head and shoulders of the female artist. And lastly it symbols an arrow through the green heart – as placed by Cupid.