Design is Play

Play Press: “New! Newer! Newly!” at Museum für Kunst und Gewerbe Hamburg


We are thrilled that our 2020 poster “#whiteliesmatter” is currently on view as part of the exhibit “New! Newer! Newly!” at Museum für Kunst und Gewerbe Hamburg. Thank you again to the 75 backers who helped Kickstart this agitprop poster (and two others) two summers ago!

Curator Dr. Julia Meer writes: “The Graphics and Poster Collection has grown continuously over the past 150 years and now encompasses some 400,000 works. This presentation focuses on new acquisitions and gifts that have recently entered the collection. They primarily consist of contemporary pieces, in recognition of the museum’s essential role in documenting current developments in design and preserving related artifacts for future generations. We collect designs that are noteworthy—due to their origin, mode of production, aesthetics or thematic content. Often ephemeral in nature, these products are closely related to the spirit of the times and thus simultaneously bear witness to political and social events and changes.”

See our “#whiteliesmatter” poster and others under Design is Play Studio Posters.

Photographs courtesy of Dr. Joanna Klysz-Hackbarth.

“Designers for Peace” International Poster Competition

Our entry to the Graphis “Designers for Peace” international poster competition. Impressively, 100% of the competition proceeds will benefit Ukraine humanitarian aid organizations.

Our design recontextualizes Antoine Coypel’s 1690 painting “The Baptism of Christ” to create a message of solidarity with Ukraine in the face of the current Russian assault. Coypel’s painting illustrates the biblical passage Matthew 3:16: “…and behold, the heavens were opened, and he saw the Spirit of God descending as a dove…”

We have taken the liberty of equating the painting’s original dove—the Spirit of God—as the bird-like golden trident from the Ukrainian coat of arms. In short, we are suggesting that Russia’s barbarous war is a wicked, ungodly act. We dedicate this poster to Kirill of Moscow, Patriarch of the Russian Orthodox Church, and a vocal supporter of both the war and of Vladimir Putin.

The patriotic phrase “Sláva Ukrayíni” means “Glory to Ukraine.” Source image courtesy of LACMA.

See our “Sláva Ukrayíni” poster and others under Design is Play Studio Posters.

“Adventures in China” Book Design

We recently completed the design of the memoir Adventures in China: What I Learned While Building a New Bank in Shanghai. The book’s themes include the influence of the Chinese Communist Party over every aspect of commerce; a lack of transparency in how decisions are made; and the sense of inscrutability experienced by foreigners doing business in China—in this case an American banker.

The design evokes these themes via a gloss black on matte black title treatment; mirrored letterforms; and a spine delineated by a glimpse of the front page of the People’s Daily from 1949, the day the People’s Republic of China was established.

We set the book title in Garage Gothic, a display typeface by Tobias Frere-Jones. The subtitle and author’s name are set in E13B, a Magnetic Ink Character Recognition (MICR) font used in the printing of checks and banking documents. The book was printed and bound by Oscar Printing, San Francisco.

See other book covers we’ve designed under Design is Play Covers.

3×3 Magazine Profile of Illustrator David Plunkert

Out now! My profile of illustrator David Plunkert in Issue 29 of 3×3 Magazine. Here is an excerpt:

What David refers to as his Block-Style are illustrations that hew to the Rock ’Em Sock ’Em Robots school of drawing: forms are reductive, flat, typically geometric, and in limited color palettes that suggest cheaply printed two- or three-color ephemera. David cites Pablo Picasso’s Cubist period and contemporary illustrators Brian Cronin and Phillippé Weisbecker as points of reference, as well as the minimalist, often primitive ethos of early twentieth century avant-garde toys. “Toys that Italian Futurist Fortunato Depero would have played with,” he explains.

That said, I would hazard a guess that the photomechanical aesthetic of ‘60s comics has seeped into David’s Block-Style via prepubescent osmosis. These illustrations are almost fetishistic in their evocation of the materiality of ink on paper: misaligned or overprinted elements, uneven textures, contaminated colors—as if someone failed to clean the press after the last print run—and imperfectly-formed Ben-Day dots.

Read the entire profile (as well as prior articles) under Design is Play Articles. [MF]

Play Press: “Trump 24K Gold-Plated” Poster Acquired by the MAD, Paris

An unexpected surprise: the Museé des Arts Décoratifs (MAD) in Paris has accessioned our 2016 “Trump 24K Gold-Plated” poster! Although we have posters in collections in the UK, Netherlands, Germany, Poland, and Switzerland, this is the first museum in France to acquire our work. Vive la France!

See our “Trump 24K Gold-Plated” poster and others under Design is Play Studio Posters.