Art Yale School

Click here to visit Yale Art School website

Even though the popularity and the fact that frankly no one would visit this website without having a previous impression about YaleArt school. I don't believe that this can substitute a website's structure and arrangement. The extremely bright colored text boxes are clashing, or sharing a border. However, there are some common elements between this design and the Fauvism movement. Even though work from the Fauvism period might seem more organized.


On the other hand, all these distracting elements should not get in the way of users actually using this website, thus the navigation bar is clear. While on the side where it is always and the elements in it are straight to the point.

Branding (Corporate)

Small businesses don't even realize they have a brand, but every single business actually does has a brand. but was the brand created intentially or by accident? A brand is more than a logo, a brand can set your directions, tell a story and has it's own visions. Branding is the art and science of defining and differentiating the company to the public. A brand defines the foundation of a company, it's the core belief, company's voice and  and it's purpose in life. However, it rotates around intent and clarity at every customer contact point, it's the purpose the drives the business. 

I've read some reviews and point of views written by different authors, each stating the basics and structure of branding. According to Wheeler, branding is a disciplined process used to build awareness and extend customer loyalty. It was also said that a mandate is needed from the start to invest the future. As was mentioned before, a brand is not a logo, but why is it more than a logo? As Marty Neumeier stated in his book The brand gap, "The term logo caught on with people because it sounds cool, but what people really mean is a trademark, whether the trademark is a logo, symbol, monogram, emblem, or other graphic device". Brand, logo and identity are not the same, but they do somehow meet at a point, all together form a perceived image for a business or product. However, a logo identifies a business in its simplest form through the use of a mark or icon, while identity is the visual aspect that form part of overall brand. Wheeler mentioned "The best identity programs embody and advance the company's brand by supporting desired perceptions. Identity expresses itself in every touchpoint of the brand and become intrinsic to a company's culture-a constant symbol of its corse values and its heritage".

Moving away from the visual identities and accessing into the function of branding, a brand can grow its perceived value, associate certain attributes or qualities amid it in the minds of customers and increase the depth of breadth of overall consumer awareness. In addition to Healey's point of view, "Your brand is what your customers think it is. A brand manager's job is to make sure customers realize, branding can help". He also stated that if a politician's voters really knew him, they'd like him better, meaning that it's a politician (company) who needs better branding. 

Brand can be confident, passion, belonging, action and security. The brand must have a purpose of existing, or in other words it can be said a brand is what a brand does and offers to it's audience. In the book More than a name recites "A graphic designer working on a new brand must be absolutely clear on why the brand exists, its positioning and what message it gives to its audience". So it's important to know the audience you’re trying to reach and design a communicable mission and purpose for each account.

It's very important to know how to connect the design of the product with marketing and business. People nowadays judge the product by it's design. Recently, I extracted some information concerning this subject from the book More than a name, that while advertising  can raise up to 8% of purchase, up to 35% of purchase decisions can be related to great packaging (and as much as 70% of purchase decisions are made in the store).  A brand should know when to be targeted, posed difficult, but irresistible challenge for brand-owners who want to win its attention, its money and even its love.

As a conclusion, It is necessary what my Brand mission is identifying and gaining the devotion of my target audience, it's necessary to reach out those objectives. My goal is to create a brand that grabs the customers' attention of the product designed. A design that is barely found in markets and stores. Since I will be focusing mostly on the design, I want the design to be the reason why people think my product is different and somehow unique from the rest. As I take the lead from the design field, my designed products will grab marketing and business to my area, that would indeed show what branding is about: visual identity (design) and marketing.

References:

Davis, M. (2005) More than a name: introduction to branding. Switzerland: AVA Publishing SA.

Design, M. (2004) Branding: from brief to finished solution. Crans-Pres-Câeligny: Rotovision SA.

Wheeler, A. (2009) Designing brand identity. Hoboken, N.J. : John Wiley & Sons.

Neumeier, M. (2006) The brand gap: how to bridge the distance between business strategy and design. Berkekley, CA: New Riders.

Healey, M. (2008) What is branding? Crans-Pres-Câeligny: Rotovision SA.

Postmodernism

                  

'Your body is a battle ground' by Barbara Kruger

             Postmodernism is a late 20th century style in art and literature which rejects the rules of modernism and mixes old and new influences in unusual ways. The products of postmodern culture may sometimes bear similarities to modernist works, but their inspiration and purpose is fundamentally different (Poynor, 2003, P.11). The development of postmodernism seen from the vantage point of the end of the century shows how alive it was with possibility but also how contradictory its features were (Hoffman, 2005, p.14). It is also considered that it had an effect on the form of communication, embracing a wide range of cognitive talents and skills, such as typography, image development and layouting. Entailing a certain kind of procedure where the entry-point is designing and communication is created and followed by the by-product (design), primarily composed of creative solutions, imagery and media compositions.

'Who is free to choose?' by Barbara Kruger

Graphic designers have created some of the most challenging examples of postmodernism in the visual arts. (Poynor, 2003, P.10)

Schreibkunst by Wolfgang Weingart.

Wolfgang Weingart was trained as a lead typesetting, having virtually no formal design training. He began his own systematic exploration of typographic form, but with a marked difference: it extrapolated the idea of visually semantic compoistion (Samara, 2002, P.115). In 1972 and 1973 he designed covers for the monthly periodical Typographische Monatsblatter with the goal of challenging design ideology. In these years he also gave a lecture tour titled 'How can one make Swiss Typography?.' Weingart is a dedicated full-time teacher, never having done a large amount of commercial work, though he does personal projects, posters for  art exhibitions and government projects and has received awards from the Swiss government for both his book covers and posters. His 500-page book 'Typography', a comprehensive discussion of  his philosophy and work, was recently published.

'Los Angeles 1984 Olympic Games'
 by April Greiman

Perhaps the best-known female designer in graphic design history, most famously known for her revolutionary work in the world of digital imaging, April Greiman, was one of Weingart's students. The award-winning graphic designer sees herself as a natural bridge between the Modernist tradition and future generations of designers. Greiman is adamant that the world has changed and that design must change with it, creating new metaphors, opening new paradigms and a whole new spirit of design. New wave post-modernists challenged the notion of modernist ordering systems and asked designers to experiment with the artistic possibilities that lay beyond the grid by experimenting with typography and image placement in direct contrast to the rigid swiss grids of the past. Her work has continued to marry the exploration of digital tools with her unique sensibilities, generating an oeuvre that maintains these principles, whether the piece is a logo for a restaurant or a 75-foot mural (Gomez-Palacio & Vit, 2009, P.179). However, the art she created is often identified for its 3D, that provides a unique experience to the viewer.

Poster designed by April Greiman

One might view postmodernism as an attack on the elitism of modernism; as a radical, one might support modernism as mere superficial kitsch (Woods, 1999, P.253). Postmodernism was an essential reaction to modernism. It tends to destroy the connection between art and everyday life, it refuses to be any single style of what art and design should be. 


Bibliography:




Gomez-Palacio, B. & Vit, A. (2009) Graphic Design, Referenced: A Visual Guide to the Language, Applications, and History of Graphic Design. United States: Rockport, Inc.


Hoffmann, G. (2005) From modernism to Postmodernism "Concepts and strategies of postmodern american fiction". Amsterdam: Rodopi.


Poynor, R.(2003). No more rules: Graphic design and postmodernism. London: Laurence King Publishing Ltd.


Samara, T. (2002). Making and breaking the grid. United States: Rockport Publishers, Inc.


Woods, T. (1999). Beginning Postmodernism. New York: Manchester University Press