- Humor is often disregarded as a viable option
in graphic design.
There is a philosophy that graphic design should be serious,
intellectual, hard-line problem-solving,
with no room for levity.
I couldn't disagree more.
Graphic design is a serious profession
that deserves to be recognized
for the rigor, complex process,
and positive results for business and culture.
But it doesn't need to be grim and self-important.
People enjoy humor so allow it into the work when needed.
An idea can range from light and clever
to completely off-beat.
This ad by Colin Forbes for Cunard Cruises is a great idea.
Forbes represents the ship with a Victorian etching.
He then uses party streamers in place of smoke
to communicate the idea of fun and casual.
This fused metaphor asks the viewer
to solve the visual puzzle and rewards him or her
with a light and joyful message.
Humor often depends on the wink towards something we expect
and turning the solution sideways.
Consider a paint by numbers project.
It exists to help those people
who like to paint within the lines and follow the rules.
Tony Palladino takes the paint by numbers idea
and ignores it entirely.
He paints his own image his way.
The flowers communicate the idea of blooming and growth.
The rebellious nature of ignoring the rules here
reinforce the message of creativity.
Each term I design the poster
for the ArtCenter Graphic Design Lecture Series.
The toughest part of the project was getting
the headshots of the speakers.
Some send theirs to me immediately,
others required repeated emails, so I gave up.
I decided to replace the headshots
with images I preferred.
From a distance, the poster reads
as a polite Swiss structure.
But upon closer inspection,
it was clearly something way off.
Surprisingly, some people asked the visiting artists,
"Is that really you?"
Finding humor in a solution can be as easy
as being as literal as possible.
California and spring are the two ideas
to be communicated here.
Michael Vanderbyl goes directly to the obvious.
The California bear with a California poppy on springs.
Now, this wouldn't work if Vanderbyl tried
to Photoshop a bear on springs holding a giant poppy.
By using simple forms, we do the work and decode the message
without being confused by any distracting details.
Humor may not be appropriate for every project.
It might read as uncaring on a campaign
to cure a terminal disease,
or frivolous on a law firms website.
But not every solution needs to be rigid and cold.
I was telling a young designer recently,
who was struggling to design materials for a hip coffee shop
with incredibly uptight logo ideas,
"It's not meant to be life-threatening,
"it's graphic design, lighten up."