Final Blog Entry of Fall Semester 2010

Matt Lanter

17 December, 2010

Final Blog Assignment

Ecker

Graphic Design History

I have decided that for my last blog assignment in my Graphic Design History course, I would go on a search for some of today’s most illustriously, professionally, and inspirationally done artwork that sets a new standard in modern art.  “What does the meaning of ‘new standard’ have to do with art styles”, you may ask?  Fresh, colorful, and exciting new complexities that immediately kick-start imaginative thinking in design work much along the same lines of an innovative recipe made with the same old ingredients; it revitalizes the dish and brings about an astounding taste for the viewer/chewer to enjoy.

 Although most well-known artist’s works are found in magazines and award-winning books; the first piece that I have chosen is not so widely renowned… yet.  However, what the artist with the alias of Marcos333 lacks in notoriety make up for in motivational beauty and stirring creativity.  I found some of his work on the website www.abduzeedo.com, which is just a blog consisting of nothing but innovative and moving artwork done by modern artists in diverse ways.  He can be found under a link on the main page called ‘Daily Inspiration’.  There may be hundreds of other artists whose work is really fine here, but towards the bottom of this page, there are a few from Marcos333 that really stand out to me. One of his is a huge fly that is made from hundreds of big and small circles; each of them with type inside.  This is a profound exploration of sundry advertisement ideas to conglomerated businesses such as Levi’s Jean Co.  The circles that make up the design are quite engaging as the eye takes in the beautiful design that advertises the famous blue jean brand.  What really responded to me about this one was the use of groups of circles to make up the entire body and the coloring style which could be stated as having a spectrum of psychedelic color through it.  From an artistic viewpoint, I feel that in this piece there is a truly personalized style connection between the elegant use of iconic psychedelic absurdity and innovatively simplistic fly-on-the-wall design of today.  It is amazing that Marcos333 is not that famous because I think an artist that produces work like this deserves to be.  To me, this image quite literally catches the spirit of the times and reminds me of how amazing art can be in this day in age.

From the other side of the gamut, an artist that was selected from a scattered group of widely established artistes from all over the world was Matt W. Moore.  I found out about Moore on the website for the book Graphis Design Annual, www.Graphis.com.  His work is placed in the Portfolios > Illustration link found on the main page.

Even though you can find quite a bit about Moore’s professional status and achievements from there; his work presents to the viewer well enough with no introduction necessary.  The inspiring piece of his that I chose was the magazine cover for Bonecrusher Magazine.  It is the one that resembles imaginative cogs designed to be the innards of a clock.  Notice how the use of flowing lines between the overlapping circles helps to guide the eyes and give focus to the arrangement as a whole.  Again, like the artist Marcus333, I find similarities between his styles of art and mine.  The rendering of circles into a progressively larger picture reminds me much of the multifaceted nature of my own work. 

In both works I have chosen, there seem to be confounding similarities as well as enlightening divergences.  Where one uses the colors that are strictly black and white, the other uses many and where one is slightly elusive, the other is positively glowing.  What I find most curious about these pictures is the way they both revert to the same style, yet one artist is more well-known even though his work was not as good as the lesser famous designer.  How could it be that even though they are both creatively inspiring, I am puzzled as to why Marcus’s work is considered less good than Moore’s?  It must be because of their source of where the art was found.  Moore’s scheme is much more popular, therefore is more highly perceived as greater graphic design work; yet where Marcus’s design is advanced in comparison, because of the origination, it is considered less creative.  I struggle to find any sensible reason as to why that is.

I was acquainted recently with the fact from a teacher of mine that knowing what good graphic design is similar to wine-tasting; to try many different kinds is to know how to judge which the best are.  The superior is obviously going to be found in venerated “containers” (books or magazines).  However, of the two pieces that I have chosen, I must contritely say a highly-esteemed source origination does not make the art any better than that of a lesser known basis.  This negates the theory to which I was informed of, and was so significantly known to be fact.  Well, considering personal opinion on inspiring graphic design, I do not think that it has anything to do with respect to the source.  It has only to do with the amount of encouragement it gives someone to make more designs.