This book is an exploration of creative processes in trying to make sense of random rules.
The letters of the alphabet were taken as the basis for brainstorming apparently random associations between different shapes, materials, colours, meaning and narratives beginning with that letter. This provided a way of opening up possibilities beyond established rules of harmony and exploring different and new ways of combining media, colours and shapes.
The book is a playful exploration of different associations of letterforms (style and typographic variants) and the words they may begin (colour, media, objects and moods) as a design challenge to see how apparently random elements can be combined to create harmonies and/or tensions.
I am interested in looking at:
associations attached to specific letters, partly but not only through the words they begin, but also their history and evolution from earlier alphabets and their general appearance eg certain letters are generally curved, some have diagonal lines etc
how the abstract anatomy of a letterform can convey mood and meaning and how this can be radically altered – shape and positioning of serifs and swashes, stroke contrast, angles and position of lines, forms of curves etc. This includes not only looking at existing typefaces, but also drawing my own letterforms to enhance the meaning of words beginning with the letter.
can letterforms morph into each other – distinguishes specific letters from each other, what do intermediate forms look like – is this an interesting area of exploration?
effects of materials, papers and use of different drawing tools beginning with the letter eg Q for quill, G for glue/graphite etc can be creatively used and combined to enhance the mood of letters with specific meanings.
how colours beginning with those letters can be used to enhance the mood eg B with blue, brown and/or black.
how all the above can be combined with positioning and layout to create a playful narrative.
My aim for the book at that point was to: explore expressive letterforms and the ways letter shapes can be playfully manipulated and combined with colour and layout dynamics to form narratives. I had thought of this possibly as a children’s book for age around 8-10 when children can read well enough not to be confused by alternative letterforms, and beginning to be much more interested in new vocabulary and ‘bending rules’.
However my ideas for the book expanded to further exploration of materials, colour and creative image creation as I progressed through Assignment 4. I became very interested in paper, and the ways that different scanning strategies can bring out different aspects of apparently very uninteresting materials like tissue paper (See post on Tissue Paper). I had also begun to look at woodcut, deepened my skills in Photoshop and Illustrator. This built on earlier work on colour and printmaking in earlier OCA courses.
There have been many aspects of the course that I want to explore further in future:
visual dynamics of design
calligraphy and expressive type and visual dynamics of letterforms – following on from my work in Assignments 3 and 4
using different papers and materials for printing and then seeing how to enhance the effects through further digital manipulation in Photoshop – drawing also on work for OCA Printmaking 1 and Illustration 2.
commercial self-publishing options and process, including further work on layout and narrative.
As a way of linking these elements, I decided on a book playing with the visual dynamics of letterforms exploring different associations of the letterforms themselves (style and typographic variants) and the words they may begin (colour, media, objects and moods) as a design challenge to see how apparently random elements can be combined to create harmonies and/or tensions.
I then started to plan production of the book in the context of both the self-publishing workflow and the inherent unpredictability of the (my) creative process – and the potential conflicts between linear planning and the need for openness to new ideas and directions as work proceeds.
In the end the product became two books – both still works in progress:
a draft book for children using my initial simple ideas and sketches, as a colourful book focusing just on letterforms. These still need further refinement and simplification, then testing with children.
a draft book for adults and teenagers where images and ideas are more (too?) complex but where I had much more scope to explore different media, relationship between words and images. As it stands I very much enjoyed experimenting and developing all the images and researching the histories of the different letters. But it does not yet hang together as a book – I need to think more about how the images relate together as a sequence with either greater diversity or greater similarity in styles.
Part of the issue was lack of time – although in the real world there are tight deadlines, and I could have been much tighter in focus at the planning stage, my purpose in this assignment was learning and exploration. Potentially there is a series of different books here, each with a different focus – for example more formal patterns, fantasy and narrative, flat design, alphabet history and so on. I now need a follow-on process of reassess and refinement – and testing with different audiences.
So the book has become much more of an exploration of the (my) creative process – interlinkages between visual expression, materials and language, the relationship between creativity and constraints in leading to new directions and inspiration. Though this exploration will be more demonstrated through its outcome in the images than discussed in the book itself. It is now much more aimed at teenagers and adults.
Many ideas and possibilities emerged in the process before then being simplified and refined around one dominant idea. For more details of the process and to contribute your own ideas see: https://www.design.zemniimages.info.
The Greed Game Box tied with a black Arab head tie (like a noose)
Top tier (6 items)
Game Booklet
Total Life
Background Booklets Iran, Oman, Saudi and UAE
Game Board loose board
Bottom Tier in folder
Players of Greed West (8 items): Money Rush Background, Khashoggi, Colin Maxwell, Hugh Boughstead, Sam Cummings, Mohammed Al Tajir, John Eggleton, Margaret MacKay.
Players of Greed East (7 items): Shk Zayed, Fatima Bint Mubarak, Shkha Sanaa, Iran deals, Empress Farah and the Black Panther, Oman, stapled loose book pages of corruption
The Task
Using a found book, significantly alter the appearance of the pages to create a volume that is personal to you.
Approach the found book in a very physical way, manipulating the pages and paper inventively. If you need to, stitch or glue a number of pages together to reduce the ground you need to cover. Decide what to remove from the book, and what to add. Use the found book as a source of ideas and inspiration – the existing text may inspire illustrative or conceptual images. Embed, overlay and integrate your work into the existing pages using whatever materials, media and processes you feel necessary. This may be digital, hand-rendered, photography, textile, or a combination of all these and more. Apply an inventive, intuitive response to materials and how these can be exploited within the context of the altered book.
Refer to your contextual research into artists and designers on the course so far. Use elements of your research as inspiration and to inform your book-altering practice.
Initial Ideas: from Money Rush to Greed Game
Choice of Book: Money Rush by Alan Duncan 1979
I had spent a long time wandering around old book stalls in Cambridge market and Oxfam second-hand bookshelves since starting this course – in anticipation of this assignment. Initially I had found an old copy of Alvarez ‘Savage Mind’ and thought this might offer an interesting complement to the theme of ‘Identity’. But in the end I thought this might lead to too dark a place – and used parts of it instead to test out interactions between different types of paint, ink and inkjet printing on book paper mock-ups, and also for the earlier parts of Assignment 4 : Anonymous.
I chose instead another book I had found in Oxfam about the impact of discovery of oil in the Middle East in 1970s: ‘Money Rush’ by Andrew Duncan and published in 1979 by The Anchor Press Ltd.
The cover blurb read:
‘the greatest transfer of wealth the world has ever known’ describing ‘in vivid personal detail the background to the new riches…a story of greed, graft, of politics at its most basic, of opportunities lost, enormous wealth gained, and some nobility. It is a guide for those who want to join in, and a warning to those who think it will last forever. The money rush affects us all.’
The book was quite topical in view of the later effects on Western/Middle East perceptions and relations as later played out in Iraq, Libya and Syria that were graphically documented on Al Jazeera. When I bought the book the Daily Mail was covered with images of Islamic women terrorists, and there were many discussions on BBC of why British women and men were becoming radicalised. The book also covered a period in Iran which I had personally witnessed – a period when our self-interested promotion of the Shah and his SAVAK secret police fuelled support for the rise of the Ayatollahs and stifling of any democratic resistance in Iran. A fact that journalists in Pakistan and Afghanistan later mentioned to me as a reason why they felt support for Osama Bin Laden.
So I felt that this book would give me a lot of interesting material to explore and work with – looking somewhat critically at Duncan’s analysis and linking the events of the 1970s to current Middle East/West relations. Something that is important background to much of my professional work. I also saw it as offering me the opportunity to explore in much more detail traditional and modern Islamic design – a longstanding interest of mine.
At the same time, because of all the many interesting possibilities, I was concerned to see how I could do justice to all the many ideas I had in the short time available for the project.
‘Petropolis’ : reading the book and (ongoing) design of the board game
As I read the book in detail, with its really bizarre stories of corruption, greed and lethargy, I started to envisage a board game – like Monopoly – and after some searching on the web I came across a series of board games called ‘Petropolis’ used by oil companies to train staff. I did some research into different versions of the game, and brainstormed through a mindmap about how I might design an adaptation that would raise questions about Oil Politics and Power, rather than just making money from oil.
As I progressed with the overall design and more in-depth reading of the book itself and research started to clarify the content. I had wanted to link the events and motivations of both Western powers and Middle Eastern players to current events in the Middle East and the growth of terrorism. But actually the issues raised by the book are relevant not only for the Middle East, but the links between money and global power more generally. So although the overall design and style is Islamic, I changed the name to ‘the Greed Game’ – the main implication will be in the way I design the Rule Book, player ‘Business Cards’ and the portrayal of the ‘Allies’ and ‘Telex Cards’ (see below) to raise more general issues as the game plays out.
The Greed Game: GameBox Contents
I decided the game would use only, and all, parts of the physical book. The existing book cover would be a folding board to wrap around the game contents. The pages would then be used as information cards and booklets, painted over to paint, draw, print, collage on other information, cut up and printed as money or as pop-up assets (I am getting interested in kirigami). Spare pages would be recycled as handmade paper for the Telex cards.d as papier mache. The only real addition might be some cloth/black plastic?? attached to the cover to make the pockets pockets for the contents, probably on card to stiffen them, and a cord to wrap the Box closed.
Game Box container design
Game Box Contents
Game Board printed on homemade paper from recycled pages
‘Greed Rules’ Game Overview Booklet printed on homemade paper from recycled pages
Player Identity Cards and tokens from the book pages
Game background booklet : overview of the events, oil interests and Islam from the book pages
Country background booklet: Iran, Saudi, Oman, UAE from the book pages
Ally cards: key actors who can be influenced/bought in each country from the characters in the book pages.
Telex cards – random opportunities and obstacle cards from the business deals and challenges faced by expats etc. These will have to be small as there are few spare pages left over for recycling as homemade paper as originally envisaged (to be done)
Money – in denominations of thousands and billions of USD and local currency. There are not enough spare pages to recycle for this, so I am planning to use the many old pill plastic covers lying around our house – a reminder of what the money could have been spent on if it had not been frittered away (even where it did not do actual serious harm).
Research
Reading and dissecting the book and initial ideas
I focused first on getting to grips with the book content in order to focus my background research on what is a very big topic. I started by dissecting the book into sections that were manageable, and also to break its ‘sanctity’ and any fear of ‘messing it up’.
As I worked through each section I researched topics that were relevant, focussing on areas that are of most interest to me in terms of future directions I might want to take my visual communications work.
Underlying concepts, messages, country background, players and allies
In my visual communications work in general I want to focus at least partly on political and social themes that I feel strongly about – to learn to communicate these in a way that can bring other people along with me as opposed to bashing them over the head with blunt messages or tiring them with compassion fatigue. This means in-depth understanding of the complexities of issues.
I studied Persian and some Arabic for part of my BA degree and so have long had an interest in Islamic art and culture, both traditional and also radical traditions of protest. Part of my model for this is the work of Dan Eldon explored earlier in the course, and some modern Islamic artists and illustrators like Marjam Satrapi, Shirin Neshat, The Little Black Fish and other artists from Middle East.
I experimented with colours and traditional geometric designs as well as modern styles, combining this with research on printing and papers that I might use.
NOTE: the two countries I have worked on most so far with developed pages are Oman and UAE (including some allies). Iran I have done a developed digital mockup. Saudi Arabia work is only very preliminary at this stage.
I read through the dissected book sections and scanned the pages and pasted these into InDesign files for the different Game contents above – as I would be able to use some of the pages directly, other information I would need to reprint on unused spare pages with some sort of painting over the original print.
I then started the rather scary process of going through the actual pages – highlighting the key information in a relevant colour, and painting over information that was not relevant, and reprinting other information needed to complete the booklet.
Alongside this I developed a sketchbook from videos and other Internet materials like photographs and design examples from the country, as well as ideas from imagination, and experimented with materials and papers – building on my experiments earlier in this part of the course.
Country Mindmaps
The contents of the book were presented in an entertaining and interesting way. Much of the responsibility for the corruption and waste attributed to Western traders and their ‘Lawrence of Arabia’ attitude and/or downright unscrupulous greed and/or the (competing) vested interests of their governments. However in the light of my other reading it was clear that some of the discussion was inevitably oversimplified. Particularly in the case of Oman and UAE the predictions of collapse and repression were to a large extent unfounded – though there was/is certainly a lot of waste and exploitation.
A key issue was to decide how to clearly differentiate the styles for each type of content, and the background booklets – and to tread a very thin line between ‘cultural sensitivity’ and stereotype. I did some initial brainstorming on design – which colours and techniques to use to meaningfully distinguish the different countries and visually communicate the differences between them – the more I researched into the countries the more the differences were apparent. I progressively developed mindmaps for each country, with different colours, shape dynamics and material techniques.
When I come to finalise this project after a break and feedback, I am planning a review of everything I have so far as Moodboards to firm up these designs and get ideas for the rest of the allies and contents that do not just repeat what I already have.
Ally cards: in each country there are key actors who can be influenced/bought to assist the players. These are 1-2 page booklets in a similar style to the country. But the idea is they could also influence other countries and change allegiance – at a price. All the allies are up for auction at a negotiated price – depending on their money/ethical track record and power status. Allies are decided, bought sold and negotiated by the players as they go along – using the information on the cards to persuade the others to part with cash, or enhance/risk their reputation by association.
Background booklets so far
The background booklets are 12-20 pages long. Mostly bound by laminating with matt or gloss laminating pockets depending on the effect I want. But some of the older pages I want to maintain fragility and will bind through gluing thin strips of cloth for the spreads (these would be consecutive pages. The booklet spreads will then be stitched. They will open the Arabic way.
Iran Background booklet initial digital mockup: Iran_background
Iran research page (forthcoming) this will include discussion of the radical movements that were going on at the time of the shah – not supported by the British or Americans. Including the women’s movement. And the recent ‘men in burkha protest movement’.
deep-rooted ‘spiritual’, sufi and also progressive art ‘feminine’ side (even lorry drivers I met in the 70s could recite poetry and the Shah and his father implemented social reforms eg in position of women) which became linked to corruption of the elite class
the very conservative male domination of the mullahs that took over with a promise to address poverty, stamp out corruption and provide a strong moral government
schizophrenia of the shah living in a fairy world of the past and imposing it with torture and repression that is intensified now under the Islamic Revolution (though currently – temporarily?? – relaxing somewhat after the nuclear deal)
Colours: like Isfahan and other mosques: deep blue, turquoise, gold and light purple
Shape dynamics: wavy, swirly Arabesques overlaid by vertical bars and shadowy figures in the dark
Materials: juxtaposing Gouache miniatures (maybe on top of photos) and transparency slides as whitewash/overlay hiding what is underneath
Oman is a relatively peaceful country, proud of its cultural past and developing a tourist industry. Before the current Sultan Qaboos, the British controlled Oman and supported very cruel tyrants in their concern to protect their access to India and the Persian Gulf. Although lots of money was wasted by Sultan Qaboos who is lambasted in the book, there seems to be little political repression and Omani women have a lot of freedom. The main concern is what will happen when Qaboos dies – he has no heir, nor has he groomed a clear successor, or set up a strong democratic system.
Colours: browns, reds, oranges
Shape dynamics: texture, curved like mosque and sea waves
Saudi Arabia is really barbaric and propped up by US interests. There seems to be little in the way of more progressive culture like the protest movements in Iran, or the opening up in UAE and Oman. The elite family is corrupt and hypocritical with millionaire lifestyles. There are though currently some glimmerings of change – though the most recent King has committed human rights abuses.
Colours
Black, white and green of Wahabi Islam. Some red as ‘forbidden’ colour.
Shape dynamics
Angular, calligraphic, abstract.
Materials
Linocut, paper cut and maybe some podgy plasticene for the effete royal family.
UAE has been cobbled together by colonial powers from 7 emirates that find it quite problematic to work together, because of historic rivalries. MKuch of what has been built has risen out of the desert because of a wish for self-aggrandisement by sheikhs like Sheikh Zayed. Sheikh Rashid of Dubai is however more progressive and visionary. Nevertheless there has been considerable and development and progress that is likely to continue and gradually democratise. The situation for women is quite conservative, but there are women airplane pilots and entrepreneurs coming up. The main issue seems to be the human rights of immigrant workers and an almost apartheidt system.
Colours
Red, Green, Black and White from the flag.
Shape dynamics
Horizontals of the desert and verticals of sky-scrapers.
Materials
Collage, tissue (the sheikhs seem to always have coloured tissues at hand), wallpaper textures.
Margaret MacKay (British Labour politician living in Abu Dhabi forthcoming)
Ghaffar Hussain (planning minister forthcoming)
Hugh Boughstead (ex British Army forthcoming)
Other Contents
Gameboard
This is a preliminary mockup – top left is Oman, top right is Iran, bottom left is Saudi Arabia and bottom left is UAE. I need to sort out:
the colours – I need to redo the country colours on the original illustrator files to match what I have done on the Background booklets.
exactly how the players will move around the board. The players move along the red and blue ‘colonial squares’ from their respective starting points (to be decided still – should there be ‘airports?’). But I am not sure how the blue and red squares will link to the country squares. There needs to be some link across the top, probably all across.
put on the pointers for the telex cards – eg should they be on the blue squares? or randomly assigned squares, and how frequent should these be. I need to do some dice maths and look again at Monopoly.
do players choose which way to go – a bit more light drafts? or are there specified routes?
Each country has a number of specific squares that have different instructions eg you are caught by the secret police, you win a big contract etc or you have to convince a key player to let you leave etc. Then there are linking squares along the trade routes: collect x amount of money, you have a conflict with x – you must negotiate and pay them off, you are diverted to x and have to make alliances to get out and so on. Some are also particular contract cards that can be taken up or traded.
Game Booklet
Main issue, background and Rules and table showing initial money and ethical starting point for each player and ally.
Stages of the Game
Opening: random distribution of identities, allies and money
Establishing the player identities: Players roll the two dice and are allocated one business identity card and token from the 12 possible business identities. They receive (or have to share) a copy of the Country Profile. The put their token on the relevant starting country on the board.
Dealing the starting money: the money cards are shuffled and each player is dealt at random 5 money cards (these will be of significantly different amounts, and some may not be in a currency used in their country).
Ally Cards: the ally cards are shuffled and half are randomly distributed between the players (not all necessarily receive the same number – depending on number of players).
STAGE 1: Initial trading of allies – players read the information they are given and, based on their character, they decide on any ethical rules they will try to follow. Based on the ethical score-card given in the Player Booklet, their money will be multiplied according to the ethical rules they establish at the beginning if they manage not to break them. Based on their amount of money, ethics and country they make some decisions on which of their allies they want to keep, and which ones they will aim to trade.
STAGE 2: Main game – players roll one of the two dice and move around the board – landing on the squares and following any telex or other instructions associated with each square. Some of these involve business opportunities and negotiation/buying/selling of allies and/or business contracts owned by others. This can be timebound – minimum 2 hours.
STAGE 3: Final assessment – who wins and who loses – assessed by the final amount of money, multiplied by any ethical rules they have managed to follow. Each player has to justify and explain their ethical claims to the others – in case of disagreement the other players vote to decide.
Player Identity Cards and tokens
12? business players are profiled in a 2 page bland (grey/brown gouache with caricatures) identity booklet with an associated identity token. These players are not initially equally distributed between countries, but players can decide to relocate, or maybe relocated through telex cards.
These are all still to be done (when I have developed cartooning and caricature skills in Illustration 2), but are likely to be:
Colquhun (Irish arms dealer, Iran)
Iraj Sabet (Iranian business man)
Lionel Edwards (British businessman, Iran)
Sharpoor Reporter (Iran)
Brigadier Eggleton (British in Oman)
Dorm Viers (Lockhead? Saudi)
Adnan Khashoggi (Saudi billionaire based in London)
Paddy Kieran (Saudi)
Ray Kelly (Saudi)
Shaheen (Saudi)
Mahdi Tajeer (UAE businessman billionaire based in London)
Man from Wisconsin (would be US businessman in UAE)
Sam Cummings (British arms dealer in UAE)
Each player selects one identity at random from the pile. Player business identity cards that are not assigned are put on one side as competitors and referred to in the telex cards? or added to the pile of allies???
Telex cards
Random opportunities and obstacle cards that are mixed up and random and associated with particular squares on the board. These are still to be designed will have to be small as there are few spare pages left over for recycling as homemade paper as originally envisaged (to be done)
These would all look the same on the outside, but would be of different types:
business deal cards that can be bought and sold to other players eg for hospitals, railways etc, arms deals.
sudden opportunities like ‘the Shah wants an audience’ or Khashoggi is interested in partnership
others are risks: ‘discovered by secret police’, ‘Family cannot stand it any more. Negotiate a move to a more interesting location (eg Oman or Dubai). Or go home – you are out of the game’.
Money
In denominations of thousands and billions of USD and local currency. There are not enough spare pages to recycle for this, so I am planning to use the many old pill plastic covers lying around our house – a reminder of what the money could have been spent on if it had not been frittered away (even where it did not do actual serious harm).
Technical explorations
In the course of developing this material I further developed my range of techniques:
I had had in mind a narrative of an ‘anonymous’ individual seeking hard to find their identity in a crowded and competitive world where advertisements are always trying to make people feel inadequate in order to buy products. Those who are not able to cope with these pressures are given very little help, and often descend into serious mental health problems. My images are informed by novels about experiences in mental health institutions like Janet Came’s ‘Faces in the Water’, also the experiences of people I know, and my own experiences of depression.
Concertina Book MockUp
Printed as a Concertina on Everyday Photo Paper
Image Spreads
I started with experimental images using Adobe Illustrator styles on the letter ‘I’.
Some experimental accidents
Reflections on my Creative Design Process
To be developed
The brief was to be very open and exploratory, going with the flow and ‘happy accidents’ in order to maximise creativity and discovery. Rather than following a strict linear sequence. My linking thread was an exploration of the theme of ‘identity’ – and the brief by the end to produce of about 12 or more printed images that could form some sort of narrative sequence and be bound together as an experimental book of about 16 pages.
The project aimed to extend my exploration into materials, the design process, and alternative, inventive approaches to book production. It involved four interlinked exercises:
Project 4.1: Papers: broadened significantly my concept of book design and the many possibilities for one single image, thinking about emotional associations as well as technical considerations of paper qualities. And exploring more papers I had not looked at in other OCA courses.
Project 4.2 : Creating Images : here I found it was very interesting to really narrow down my options to Illustrator, and black and white exploration of styles. Although this meant that in many ways technique preceded meaning, I discovered new themes and potential meanings in the quite random process of image experimentation.
Project 4.3: Printing I focused on Inkjet printing because this was I type of printing I had so far mostly taken for granted and had not really explored all the possibilities of using different types of paper, mediums, overprinting and so on. Other types of printmaking I had done in my OCA printmaking course, and also incorporate in the Assignment piece. I produced a sketchbook of images on the papers I had collected. This led to many ‘Happy Accidents’ and discoveries, for example with OHP Transparencies as well as overprinting text.
Project 4.4: Collating and binding I looked at different combinations and narratives using InDesign but going back and forth between printing, selection, collation.
BUT my design process was not at all linear. It was more useful to see the projects as parallel aspects between which I moved as questions from one level raised questions or possibilities in another.
My selection and trial of papers was (and is) ongoing as I think more about what effects I am trying to have, and also discover more about different ways of printing – for example the Happy Accidents with OHP transparencies led to me trying similar types of smearing on other glossy types of paper. Different papers were added to my experimentation as I went along.
Development of the images was interlinked with considerations of narrative and the ways they were to be bound (linear or cyclical, as booklet or concertina where all the spreads would be seen at once?) and also papers and printing (what effects would different papers have, inclusion of happy accidents to accentuate/contrast the meaning, what is possible or not possible to print)
Printing and the various unexpected outcomes led me back to re-evaluate and explore other possibilities in the images, and try different types of paper
Binding and collating involved questions of narrative and the relationship between images, which again led me back to the images themselves in terms of both colour and stylistic consistency as a sequence, whether or not different types of paper should be used for different images and types of overprinting.
Throughout the process to avoid just getting lost in ‘accidents’ I needed to keep asking myself – what am I trying to say with all this?
delve deeper and deeper into madness and depression as a futile search for a phantom identity (does it exist???if so can I find it??? or is the brain incapable of doing that?)
come to the conclusion that is it better to just go with the flow of life and enjoy it?
show a brave anonymous individual being made to feel they have to ‘be cool’ and explore their individuality?
is their self-exploration just amusing?
or does it lead to disintegration and loss of sense of self?
do they then reach any happy ending? or just a compromise?
But my understanding and narrative through some of these issues also evolved from the technical and design discoveries, not from pre-planning, and I think this external and somewhat random input helped the narrative from becoming too navel-gazing and enabled a bit of humour.