Dinamico

Dinamico is a triptych primer on my design process — pattern recognition, deconstruction through internalization, and metaconstruction. Three sets of three haiku set to music, animated typography & graphics, and photography.

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dinamico music and haiku video

Drawing inspiration from Constructivist artist Alexander Rodchenko, this project was conceived with the layouts of three posters using some of my photographs of New York CIty that feature strong inclined lines; a recurring element in Russian Constructivism. Applying the use of fundamental shapes such as triangles and circles — well-established as the foundation of modern design — I embarked on a design solution that presents historical design references, the deconstruction to root elements, and a translation in a multimedia experience. A design process about my design process. Metadesign.

In my first poster, a photograph of the boardwalk in Rockaway Park, NY centers on slat awning and its shadows to reveal a contrasting arrangement of inclined stripes from my camera vantagepoint. These stripes become the motif that sets the pattern for the entire work. After applying my color pallette, the yellow and white stripes brought to mind the 1978 gig poster for Cabaret Voltaire, Joy Division and The Tiller Boys. I decided to use this design reference as a theme for the entire project, and the poster backstory as a theme for the first angle of the triptych. Expressed in haiku, the reference of the backstory is the climax: when young Peter Saville — the perfectionist graphic designer for Factory records — notoriously presented his finished event poster — cataloged as Fac 1 — the night of the event itself.

setting the pattern

The first angle of Dinamico is a celebration a century-long procession of design influences that begins with a coalescence of ideas and practices that solidified in 1919 at Bauhaus. Inspired by works at the first Weimar Bauhaus exhibition, particularly from Suprematist El Lissitsky, and Constructivist and László Moholy-Nagy, Jan Tschichold became a prominent developer of 20th century design particularly with the use of type. The New Typography was a major touchstone for Peter Saville as he formulated his design appropriations in the post-punk landscape of late 70s UK. The reference to 1 9 1 9 7 8 in the haiku is the timespan from the 1919 birth of Modernist design, to the 1978 date of Saville’s plunge into the Postmodern. Additionally, the rhythmic cadence of the numbers is a nod to the opening of Joy Division’s “Warsaw, with the count-off at the beginning is actually shouting Rudolph Hess’s prisoner of war serial number. The music score is composed in three distinct styles — beyond the glam-rock intro — from post-punk, to 4AD-style gothy dreampop, and ending with techno to reflect the three movements in the piece.

style guide

• logo design process • typography • color pallete

the innerworld is revealed

The second angle of Dinamico explores the philosophical Dark Night of the Soul — expressed in music and design idioms as symbolic analogy: the internalization of the history and image of these design patterns, and the subsequent deconstruction of elements down to a primary duality. The contrast of light and darkness is expressed as the threshold between the subject and the object.

Direct action on this awareness, Dinamico, takes form as the rhythmic vibration between the two, carrying this genetic material into a new integrated pattern. In the final angle of Dinamico, reconstruction and reconciliation of the original rhythmic elements ensues in a new, self-aware context of holism.

cryptic triptych of triplets

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