I love this store. It made my day when I met Melissa Catanese, its proprietor, a photographer and book lover who moved back to Pittsburgh from New York in early 2011 and opened Spaces Corners a few months later. The second floor of 3803 Butler Street is a quiet and serene space for book buying and perusal. Don’t miss it during your Lawrenceville outing, but if you do, check out their booth at the upcoming Pittsburgh Photo Fair.
If you follow this blog, you may have noticed that we recently got a makeover. You may have wondered whether, from one visit to the next, you actually just witnessed the unveiling of the 2013 Carnegie International’s graphic identity?! And the answer would be yes. Yes you did, and you were among the first to see it.
The design was developed by Kloepfer-Ramsey, a graphic design studio in New York, established in 2010 by Chad Kloepfer and Jeff Ramsey. They work primarily with clients in the fields of art and architecture on print, identity, interactive, and exhibition-related projects. Chad and Jeff sent me this description of the design concept they’ve developed for us:
In working to establish an identity for the show we focused on two of the main themes: play and dissonance. These themes helped create a structure for thinking and form making, in devising a system in which various elements can be played with and positioned in terms of scale, shape, color, placement, and material. By creating a core group of visual shapes, images, and verbal cues the identity starts to take shape through the juxtaposition of these elements, almost like a mood board. Sometimes they come together in very formal, more aggressive arrangements, and at other times less rigid or more open-ended groupings leaving the viewer to make connections between the pieces. This strategy of groupings seemed to align with how the curators were thinking about the artists and their relationship(s) to one another. As the identity starts to react to the forms and content of its application throughout the show, and on the various materials produced, that diversity, or dissonance, is made concrete. Very little is seen as “off limits” for the possibilities of application, since in the end, this helps produce a richer, more varied experience. Overall, the identity is meant to provide a playful and informative counterpoint to the exhibited works.
The earliest Carnegie International catalog covers featured a profile with the motto “Honos Alit Artes” (in English, “Honor feeds the arts”). This phrase is attributed to Cicero, who argued that an artistic discipline, such as painting, requires recognition and support from the public in order to flourish. This cover design was used from 1896 to 1914, when the annual show was put on hold due to the war. When the exhibition was brought back in 1920, the covers had a new, modern design. This Art Deco look was used from 1920 to 1922, and the show was renamed the International Exhibition of Paintings. 1924 saw the introduction of a new cover design, this time a classic image of a goddess. (more…)
Covers of books by William S. Burroughs and Jack Kerouac and Neal Cassady and John Clellon Holmes and David Goodis
