Fear not, publishers: print is not dead. But unattractive print sure is.
RISD Museum presents Graphic Design: Now in Production, an art exhibition displaying new-age graphic design and the mediums with which it’s utilized. Originally co-organized by the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis and the Smithsonian’s Cooper-Hewitt, National Design Museum in New York, the 100-plus-piece display of varied publications is now creatively housed in Providence through August 3rd.
A display case protects book jackets and magazines varnished in bold fonts, illustrations and colors; canvas posters matted with deep, glossy colors mask the white-washed gallery; an entire wall is dedicated to typography and its many layers.
The exhibit is a living testament to the unreached boundaries of digital media, the previously unscathed methods that graphic design has expanded on. The literal art form has become more than bold typefaces and Pantone color wheels–graphic design fuses art with branding.
Through these interpretive publications, prints and digital media, artists express their recurring ideas–essentially, their brands–with the smooth aesthetics that can only be attributed to digital art and its printed product.
Highlighting the best in its extensive genre, Graphic Design: Now in Production is a portal for the digitally hindered and a dream to the digitally inclined.
