- Working with historical images
that have multiple layers of meaning
or filming photos already embedded with a plot is not easy,
but there are ways of working with more than one image
to make a message clear when text and typography
are not a good option.
Cipe Pineles was a pioneer in magazine design.
She challenged norms and created covers
that we would find fresh today.
Her cover for "Seventeen Magazine"
depicting a young girl's life year-round
communicates a sense of nature and play effortlessly.
We are transmitted the message by the natural forms
from autumn, winter, spring, and fall
that surround the model.
They aren't complicated or filled with multiple meanings.
They are simply objects the young woman may have collected.
A more typical solution would be
to fill the page with descriptive text,
but that would be heavy-handed
and fail to capture the same light spirit.
It was critical that the audience understand the content
when "Show Magazine" launched.
Rather than listing all of the media
and subjects that "Show" covered,
Henry Wolf used images to represent them.
By inserting them into a giant number one,
it was clear that this was the first issue.
"Bold Scandinavia" used the same technique
of combining easily recognizable images
to create an identity system for the Swedish History Museum.
The museum's mission is to create
curiosity and interest in history
and for the visitor to reflect on the link
between the past and the present.
Juxtaposing a historic image with a contemporary
make the message clear immediately
and asks the viewer to understand the similarities.
When I was asked to design a cover
of a calendar for "AIGA Los Angeles",
I tried to find a fused metaphor.
Could I combine a freeway with big dates
or a surfboard with a calendar carved into it?
But these didn't convey the message that I really wanted
which was there is no difference in LA.
Each month can have an 80 degree and sunny day.
There are no obvious seasons.
So combining 12 images of a swimming pool for each month
not only communicated the concept
but created a compelling pattern of LA colors.
In these examples, each image is a stand-in
for a word or idea.
Of course, words could work,
but the image adds a spirit and more vibrant visual.
An intricate idea such as the comparison
between the past and present is much easier to convey
with a painting and photograph than a paragraph,
and if one image is good, more can be better.