So, the question I left you guys with: What is Graphic Design? Well, if you read the post at AIGA (http://www.aiga.org/guide-whatisgraphicdesign), then you read about posters, advertisements, branding, books, web design and a bunch of other stuff like that. On the surface, that is what Graphic Design is, and again AIGA's post is a very good summation of the topic. And it should be, after all AIGA is the American Institute for Graphic Arts, they are pretty much the foremost authority of Graphic Design. What their article doesn't cover though, is the subjective view on what Graphic Design is, as it is individual and... well... subjective.
If you've been following my blog you may remember I had a post about artists and the passion I feel they should have for their art. (http://cgwise.blogspot.ca/2017/05/the-passion-of-art.html) Well, Graphic Design is Art. It is the means of communicating the message the artist is empassioned about. In this way it becomes a language, and it's a language which has been around since the dawn of time.
Cave paintings have been found that can be dated as far back as 40,800 years. That's more than 38,000 years before our Current Era(CE). It's long before people began recording history. Aboriginals have long been associated with body paint. Natives of North America would decorate their bodies for various occasions, but each color and symbol had a specific meaning. It was a communication, either to the wearer, other members of the tribe, other tribes, or even the spirit world. The ancient Mayans and Egyptians developed pictures to actively communicate and record various things. These pictures are now known as hieroglyphs. Modern writing evolved from pictographs to become the alphabets that we know today. Pictures have been used as a language, longer than history can say, and that hasn't changed to this day.
We do have a habit of viewing pictures as entertainment, which in turn leads us to make pictures for entertainment. We've got them hanging on walls, in books, on TV, in video games and comics. So many of us hear the adage that a picture is worth a thousand words, but we never stop to think about what words a picture is trying to tell us. In many cases now, even the person making the picture doesn't know what the picture says. It's merely a means to an end.
Graphic Design steps away from that trap and intentionally puts a message into the picture. We look at every element we use, from letters, to colours, to shapes and ask how we can convey our message. Absolutely everything created through the lens of Graphic Design is intentional. There are no accidents. But there is room for interpretation. That interpretation is just like the way we interpret the spoken word and don't always understand what the speaker meant. Sometimes there are unintentional messages in the work, just like there is in speech. And of course there's always the conventions of different cultures.
In short, Graphic Design is the art of language as art.
--Charlie Griffin
Stick with me, and we'll get wise together.
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Rosé Rose
Maple Leaf Gardens
Hidden Depths
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