Rituals: mock up

The subject I chose for this semester in Viscom was religion. At first I was not overjoyed with my decision, but after a bit of weighing out the possibilities I found that this subject may have been the perfect one for me. Beginning with such a broad subject was not ideal, so I narrowed it down to the only religion I've ever known, Catholicism. I don't consider myself a practicing Catholic, but after years of Sunday mass and catechism classes something must have rubbed off. I suppose it might have something to do with my fascination of all the rituals and my lack of understanding or it could be the fact that it's all just so stunningly beautiful. Either way I am happy to say that my book of artifacts is coming along well. I still need to refine the overall flow of my layouts as well as completing a couple iterations of the cover.

As of now my artifacts include: candles, a chalice, Palm Sunday cross, stoups, Our Lady of Guadalupe, confessionals, rosaries, and a monstrance, the vessel used in Catholic churches to display the Eucharist host.

 

  

Within my spreads I am applying a few rule to each of my compositions. Most dominantly I am featuring some form of an arc, cropping of the artifacts to the opposite ends of the page, and using various sizes of the artifact within each spread. Although I have a handle on the rules, I still need to make the pattern of the spreads much more clear. After speaking to Jamie about it, it was settles that the best way to go was to have a pattern that consisted of layouts that cropped the images from left to right and layouts that cropped the images from top to bottom.

How Does the Smithsonian Collect Artifacts?  (reading/response)

"The best of these instruments are like time machines; they provide today exactly the same experience that they gave more than a hundred years ago. With them we can experience science in much the same way as our ancestors, and with that evidence we can begin to understand what science meant to them."

Relating our current project for Viscom II to how the Smithsonian collects artifacts made me understand the goal for what my final book should communicate. After reading this article it became apparent that the artifacts we choose to include in our book have deeper meaning than the image itself. The image provides a visual reference to its function and it provides the possibility of experiencing the artifact. The better selection and variety of artifacts we collect, the better our understanding and therefore a much more seamless execution. 

Making the Invisible Visible 

The main message I received from this reading was that with out a concept you don't have good design. This reading drew me closer to the idea that by having a clear, concise concept in every project life will be much simpler because you now have a guide. This method is absolutely employed in our current project. Our theme is the centralized idea that is connecting every artifact to it's parent.