Break the square

This thesis traces the process of my two years' study. After graduation from college in China with a BFA degree in graphic design, I still felt something was missing in my education, that is, the typography experiments. It became one of the reasons I chose to pursue graduate study in the US, a Western country with an excellent legacy in visual communication study. I became familiar with the history o f the Western typography from the first few projects. With a Chinese background, I thought about applying those methodologies into a Chinese graphic language. In order to do that, I studied the similarities and the differences between the Chinese and the English written language From the result o f the comparison study, I noticed the close relationship between the Chinese language and the square form. I remember it was addressed on the first day of Chinese in elementary school. However, during this research project I studied this connection on a much deeper level. The English typographic experiments always break the rules in the traditional letterpress. The Arts and Crafts Movement emphasized book layout design, starting the development o f numerous typefaces in the late 19th century. The modernist era, during the 20th century, broke down the rules in art and shattered traditional layout approaches.These historical events influenced the way I approached typography study. Upon experimentation, I tried to bring a fresh approach to the Chinese typography and named my study "break the square."Breaking the tradition and creating new approaches is a lifetime philosophy. For the initial phase of my study in these two years, I hope that the"break the square" study could use the square, a form that was studied for thousands o f years throughout the world, to bring to Westerners a basic understanding of the Chinese written language.

BREAK THE SQUARE by Fei Wang A thesis submitted to the faculty of The University of Utah 1 partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Fine Arts in Art Department of Art and Art History The University of Utah August 2004 Copyright © Fei Wang 2004 All Rights Reserved THE UNIVERSITY OF UTAH COLLEGE OF FINE ARTS SUPERVISORY COMMITTEE APPROVAL o f a thesis submitted by Fei Wang This thesis has been read by each member of the following supervisory committee and by majority vote has been found to be satisfactory. 7 Chairman: Raymond Morales Carol (J Joseph Marotta THE UNIVERSITY OF UTAH COLLEGE OF FINE ARTS FINAL READING APPROVAL To the Graduate Council of The University of Utah: I have read the thesis o f ___________________ Fei Wang_______________________ in its final form and have found that (1) its format, citations, and bibliographic style are consistent and acceptable; (2) its illustrative materials including figures, tables, and charts are in place; and (3) the final manuscript is satisfactory to the Supervisory Committee and is ready for submission to the Graduate School. " V / a y _ _ ^ Date Raymond Morales Chairperson, Supervisory Committee Approved for the Major Department Elizabeth Peterson Chairperson Approved for the Graduate Council ( Phyllis Haskell Dean, College of Fine Arts ABSTRACT This thesis traces the process of my two years' study. After graduation from college in China with a BFA degree in graphic design, I still felt something was missing in my education, that is, the typography experiments. It became one of the reasons I chose to pursue graduate study in the US, a Western country with an excellent legacy in visual communication study. I became familiar with the history of the Western typography from the first few projects. With a Chinese background, I thought about applying those methodologies into a Chinese graphic language. In order to do that, I studied the similarities and the differences between the Chinese and the English written language. From the result of the comparison study, I noticed the close relationship between the Chinese language and the square form. I remember it was addressed on the first day of Chinese in elementary school. However, during this research project I studied this connection on a much deeper level. The English typographic experiments always break the rules in the traditional letterpress. The Arts and Crafts Movement emphasized book layout design, starting the development of numerous typefaces in the late 19th century. The modernist era, during the 20th century, broke down the rules in art and shattered traditional layout approaches. These historical events influenced the way I approached typography study. Upon experimentation, I tried to bring a fresh approach to the Chinese typography and named my study "break the square." Breaking the tradition and creating new approaches is a lifetime philosophy. For the initial phase of my study in these two years, I hope that the"break the square" study could use the square, a form that was studied for thousands of years throughout the world, to bring to Westerners a basic understanding of the Chinese written language. v TABLE OF CONTENTS ABSTRACT..................................................................................................iv LIST OF FIGURES......................................................................................vii ACKNOWLEGMENTS..............................................................................viii INTRODUCTION........................................................................................1 RETROSPECTIVE........................................................................................2 Type Specimen.................................................................................. 2 Books for Two C itie s.......................................................................7 Punctuation Study............................................................................8 Calendar 0 3 ....................................................................................... 11 CREATIVE PROJECT................................................................................ 14 Justification........................................................................................ 15 Thesis Problem................................................................................. 16 Delimitation.......................................................................................16 Antecedent/Precedent.......................................................................16 Process...............................................................................................IB Presentation........................................................................................ 27 Evaluation........................................................................................ 27 Conclusion........................................................................................ 28 Further Direction..............................................................................28 APPENDIX : LAYOUTS IN THE EXHIBITION "BREAK THE SQUARE" ...................................................29 LIST OF FIGURES Figure Pa§e 1. Baskerville................................................................................................ 4 2. Bauhaus..................................................................................................... 4 3. Graustich.................................................................................................. 4 4. K a i..............................................................................................................6 5. Song........................................................................................................... 6 6. H e i..............................................................................................................6 7. Different spacing..................................................................................... 10 8. Punctuation study..................................................................................... 10 9. Calendar pocket........................................................................................ 13 10.Construction I ..........................................................................................21 11..Construction I I ........................................................................................ 22 12.Proportio n 23 13.Directio n 24 14.O rd e r........................................................................................................ 25 15.F rame........................................................................................................ 26 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I would like to extend my eternal gratitude to many people who helped me throughout my graduate study: Carol Sogard, for always providing guidance and encouragement; Ray Morales, for enthusiasm and inspiration through unique analogues; Joe Marotta, for stimulating discussions and general advice; Thomas Kass, for broad knowledge and understanding of the oriental culture. I am also grateful to my family, without their support, this thesis would not be possible. INTRODUCTION I came to the United States on June 29, 2001, right after my graduation from Shanghai Jiao Tong University, in China, with a bachelor's degree in graphic design. My decision was motivated by the desire to experience another part of the world before plunging into the commercial industry. Salt Lake City is a place totally different from Shanghai, where I lived for 22 years. During the first few months in Salt Lake City, I experienced culture shock, language barriers and dramatic environmental changes. When I went back to Shanghai for a vacation, speaking Chinese again gave me a warm embrace. When I returned to Utah, I felt eager to introduce my culture to people I knew there. But the topic is really too large. As my interest always lies in typography, I would rather just introduce Westerners to the Chinese written language. At the same time, my awareness of the Chinese language continued to change with my graphic design study. As a graphic designer, I began to think about the way Westerners look at the Chinese language, as well as pay attention to the details. In a series of studies, I discovered more and more relationships between the form of a square and the Chinese characters. Therefore, I named my research " break the square." RETROSPECTIVE Throughout the past two years, I can trace my thoughts and mark out the experiences that have changed my focus on design. These experiences influenced my approach to the creative project that I developed in the second year of my studies. Type Specimens This project was to study the origin of six specific typefaces. Information was gathered for six type specimens, including features, history and application. As my native language is Chinese, I selected three Chinese typefaces and three English typefaces. Since this was my first step in studying typography. I completed a series of studies on the history of Western typefaces. Gradually, I became aware of the English typefaces from different times. Following the timeline, I noticed that typeface design became less decorative and more simplified. Based on this observation, Baskerville, Bauhaus, and Graustich were chosen as the three English type specimens in the project. For the Chinese type specimen studies, I chose the three most widely used Chinese typefaces in the letterpress industry: Kai, Song, and Hei. Like their English counterparts, they also represent the changing styles in Chinese typographic history. Methodology Baskerville represents the delicate grid system used in typeface design during the late 19th century. Every line was measured and set in a certain position; each serif was defined by a curve with a definite axis. This system not only created an attractive visual language, but also determined the main grid I designed for the layout of the type specimen. See Figure 1. Among the six type specimens I was most interested in BAUHAUS. It is a sans serif typeface, designed by Herbert Bayer, with the name "Universal" in the era of the Bauhaus. What aroused my attention was the modular form of the typeface. The alphabets were tiled with the same curves, angles and lines. Therefore, by flipping, rotating or reflecting, it was easy to turn one letterform into another. Through a series of alterations, this modular aspect was brought out in the design of the layout. Each letterform had a tight connection with its neighbor. The set yields the grid for the layout of this type specimen. See Figure 2. Graustich was designed in the 21st century and was influenced by the digital age. On the computer screen, the form of the letters consisted of four by four units, eliminating all the curves. To match the simplified characteristic of this typeface, the grid for this type specimen was implied by a matrix of points. Another unique element is the punctuation. Compared to a common exclamation mark, Graustich's exclamation seems to be so out of scale that it attracts attention. Therefore, it was exaggerated in the layout. See Figure 3. Kai was the first official typeface used in Chinese printing. It was an II ^ II 1 H i Figure 1 Baskerville i I I -► f | f t n - u - unH n n - in Figure 2 Bauhaus <t « f i k i r i Figure 3 Graustich alternative to the calligraphy that was popular at the time the letterpress was invented. Because of this, I selected the historical grid for calligraphy as the unique feature that determined the basic layout grid. See Figure 4. Song has become the most popular typeface in the publishing industry. It is easy to distinguish this typeface because of the contrast between the basic strokes of a character. The vertical strokes tend to be five times thicker than the horizontal ones. Song is also the first modified serif typeface in Chinese letterpress history. Therefore, the unique feature of the basic strokes was the main idea and determined the grid of the layout. See Figure 5. In the layout of Hei, which originally means black in Chinese, I paid special attention to the punctuation. Not only because punctuation was introduced to China when the time Hei was invented, but also for the unique characteristics the punctuations possesses in this typeface. Hei is the first sans serif Chinese typeface. However, the sans serifs reduced the legibility of this typeface, because the tight construction of the strokes in equal thickness made the characters very similar to black squares. I chose to emphasize this characteristic by separating the punctuation from the text. Thus, I reinforced the similarities between the squares and the characters in Hei. See Figure 6. This project helped me become aware of Western typographic history. From the research, I found out how artists in previous centuries put much effort into breaking the rules of tradition. The idea to apply the English typographic experiments to Chinese came into being. It triggered my theme for the creative project. / \ / A/ / . . Figure 4 Kai Figure 5 Song n 1 t m i o k m ............ " ............................... Figure 6 Hei Books for Two Cities Before coming to the United States, I lived in the metropolitan city of Shanghai for 22 years. However, when I returned to China in December 2001,1 had a very different perspective of Shanghai. A Chinese motto came to my mind: "You never know the true face o f a mountain when you are in it."1 Six months of living in Salt Lake City gave me a new perspective in life. It affected my viewpoints when I returned to Shanghai. This inspired me to illustrate my new views towards Shanghai and Salt Lake City in the design of two individual books. The content of the books depended on the images I took from this trip. I took quite a few photographs of the unique landmarks of Shanghai. I then took photos of the equivalents in Salt Lake City. When the images were ready, I categorized the pictures into population, traffic, and food. In these categories there are sharp contrasts between the two cities. Also I added unique features of each city, for example, the "quilt culture" in Shanghai and the "black tie Sunday" in Salt Lake City. My aim was to emphasize the large contrasts between the two cities, yet I also intended to harmonize the two books into a set. Every page consisted of three layers that highlighted the important aspects, the image, the text descriptions and the illustrations. Through these layers a link was created between pages using the same form of structure and color. On the other hand, the two books became consistent with the same format. I used the same Chinese binding to finish the two books. On the cover, the image of my shoeprint enclosed a map of the city. The shoeprint map is my personal touch. It 1 Poem of Song Dynasty: TI XI LIN BI, Su Shi. 8 symbolized my experience as a Chinese citizen experiencing the life of the two cities. Browsing through the two books, the reader is exposed to general facts about the two cities, as well as my personal feelings. Punctuation Study I continued to conduct more research on punctuation. Specifically, I spent more time studying the application of punctuation when it was first introduced to China in the early 20th century. Initially, there was no punctuation in the Chinese language. Sentences were read from up to down, right to left. Where to stop the sentence depended on analyzing the grammar. Literate people used to hold a brush while reading a book, marking down a circle for a stop in the sentence. It was not until the beginning of the 20th century when the Western punctuation was introduced to China. That was an interesting time in the Chinese publishing industry. Debates between keeping the traditional vertical reading approach and adopting the Western horizontal approach seemed endless. As the reading approach remained undecided, every print shop had its own ideas about punctuation placement. First of all, I should explain the Chinese approach to typeface layout. While English words are comprised of letters, Chinese words are made from characters. The space between each character is static; thus one sentence has no specific spacing between subject and verb, verb and object. Every Chinese reader should understand the meaning through grammar. Yet, it is necessary to add spacing between sentences, like English, to accelerate reading speed and avoid misunderstanding. That is the background for punctuation. See Figure 7. Generally speaking, most books followed the same rules at that time. Punctuation took up one space of a character in order to make the whole text justify to each side. However, punctuation is an icon for a sentence break. It is too small to fill all the square space for a character. In most circumstances, it has a close relationship with the text. That is where all the variations took place. Punctuation was put in the middle of the square space to maintain consistency of the text in some print shops. Other printers placed it in the lower left comer of the square space, leaving it a blank space for the sentence break. From books published between 1920 and 1950,1 collected four samples of the different punctuation placements. These samples are the resources for my four final layouts. After gathering the information about time, text, signal of reading direction and punctuation placement, I divided them into individual layers. Each layer that contained the same information in the four layouts had a visual connection. Text quoted from the original book was colored a 30 percent gray, for it served only as the background layer for this subject. Information on the text, such as the year the book was published and the title of the book, was the appendix layer shown in a 70 percent grey. Among them, the punctuation layer was printed in red, as a highlight on the warm tone paper and light gray text. I tried to notify readers of the different punctuation placement in the squares. On the back, I enlarged the punctuation squares that indicated the punctuation position on the front. The whole layout was then designed in a square form to emphasize the connection to the square. See Figure 8. 9 10 space English: The New Culture Movement was brought up in 1920. Chinese: 1 9 2 0 ^ ^ 1 1 ^ ^ HI Figure 7 Different spacing 7 ^ ; | ^ I T L a f t m , m ♦ j t I f o + Figure 8 Punctuation study The punctuation study was an experiment in visual communication. I tried to educate the audience to pay attention to the trivialities in life, for there could be a story in it. Alterations of punctuation were not randomly posed. Each placement had a close relationship with the arrangement of the text in a specific historical background. Finally, the resource of this research is the form the Chinese language possessed: The Square. Calendar 03 During these punctuation studies, I became tired with the Chinese language. A calendar design in the winter of 2002 was a needed break I gave myself. The result was not a departure from the study of the square. The last project revealed a puzzle of how to position relatively small objects inside a square. In the punctuation study, a full stop was set to stay in a different position of the square. I asked myself: What if it collided with the edge? Numbers introduced themselves as the theme of this project. Initially, I was going to make a book design with a bookcase and inner pages. I noticed the indent on a bookcase that was designed for the user to pull out the book by hand. The negative space of the number one in Baskerville ran into my mind. It was November, the end of 2002, when the idea for my calendar 2003 came into being. I intended to make 12 pockets standing for each month. In each pocket, a calendar for the month lay inside. One can take the individual month card out while leaving the rest covered. This calendar could also be easily renewed by changing the month cards inside at the beginning of the next year. The visual problem was to design a unique 11 indent in the pocket for each month that indicated the opening. This indent needed to be visually appealing so that people would feel refreshed to take out a new month card. From the shape of "1", I studied the negative space when each number was placed on the edge of a square. The height of number was set at 2/3 the length of a square side. When "1" was justified to the left side, the serifs embraced a shape that could be separated from the square and serve as the indent of a calendar pocket. Yet, every number has its unique shape, and the shape it created from the square edge was flexible. Criteria should be set to determine the way each number touches the square. More research was conducted on the feature of the indent. Indents on the pocket suggest to the readers where the inner page could be pulled out. At the same time, this part should be durable because frequent touch would make it worn out easily. Based on this, an indent on the pocket was usually designed to be an evident yet simple shape without any sharp comers. This rule helped me set the position of numbers. Baskerville numbers were chosen to be the subject in this project because of their elegant serif design. I marked out eight points in a square: four comers and four sides. One number was set in those points and yielded eight placements. Comparing each situation, I was able to pick out some placements that divided the square into two parts exhibiting a large contrast in size. The smaller part was discarded as the indent of the calendar pocket. Then I eliminated those shapes with sharp angles so the indents would be durable. Each month was then put together and some modifications were made to avoid redundant placement between the adjacent months. See Figure 9. 12 corner side corner adjacent inner page conflicted sharp corner t i l ideal contrast Figure 9 Calendar pocket CREATIVE PROJECT The creative project can be seen as an accumulation of the research I conducted during the past two years. Looking back, I can clearly see my concern in three areas: typography, language and form. They affect each other like a formula. That formula could be explained as: Typographic design cannot be considered independent from written language. Because written languages differ from one another in form, no specific experiment could be applied to multiple languages. On the other hand, different forms provide the possibility of changes, which are the resource for typographic experiments. Although English typographic experiments might not always be applied to Chinese, some of them can be inspiration. With this formula, I looked at the process from my previous studies. I tried to research typography in Chinese; specifically, the square features of the Chinese written language led my focus to the square form. At the time I break the square, I will also break the myth of the Chinese written language. As a result, more typographic experiments will be revealed. Yet, the current question is: How to break the square and where to begin? Although it would seem inconvenient to focus on a Chinese subject in a Western environment, indeed it was this situation that helped me. The legacy of the typographic study in the US provided me with rich materials for artistic experiments. These experiments inspired me to closely examine the form of the written language. Through the study of serifs, curves, head and foot of the English letterforms, I cultivated an attitude concerning the details within the form of the language. Instead of looking through materials on language in China, I was able to gain what I needed through comparing English and Chinese. Contrasts in languages pinpointed the specific features they had, giving me a start in dissecting the Chinese language. Moreover, I felt the responsibility to introduce the Chinese language to the Western audience. The beginning challenge was to discover the most effective, understandable way to do this. Justification For bilingual graphic designers or visual communicators who stand at the intersection between their own background and a new environment, we often feel the obligation to relate the two lives with visual approaches. The problem this project presents can be addressed as bringing people a new system and describing this through the language they are familiar with. The Chinese written language is a new system to the Western audiences. The square is a universal visual language. Design methods in the research served as the key to use the square and form a connection with the Chinese written language and the Western audience. Through this project I hope to encourage graphic designers to solve complicated problems with simple, yet effective solutions. More importantly, it teaches designers how to look at a problem from different perspectives and find creative solutions with seemingly unrelated approaches. 15 Thesis Problem This project uses the square as a visual language to introduce the Chinese written language system to the Western audience. Meanwhile, it is supposed to develop design methods and inspire potential new typographic experiments in Chinese. It is also designed to educate the Chinese graphic design audience about Western methods and the application of Western typographic techniques to the Chinese language. Delimitation This is not a study of a basic graphic form. Rather, it uses the square as an element to bring about the study of design methods. This is not a study about the history of Calligraphy, a traditional art form in China; rather, the visual communication created as a result o f this project is intended to introduce the Chinese writing language system to the Western audience. This study is not an analysis of bilingual design, but Chinese is drawn as a demonstration of a visual system. Antecedent/Precedent El Lissitzky O f 2 Squares: A Supremacist Tale Skythen, Berlin. 1922 This is a short picture book for children. Lissizky used the elementary forms- square, circle and rectangle-to tell his story in a simplified manner to young audiences. Although designed as a children's book, this book is more valued as an excellent graphic design example in the history of visual communication. It studies the relationships between simple forms- square and circle and two squares in different colors and/or in different proportions positioned statically or dynamically. This book inspired me to demonstrate a new system with basic forms. The design principles in this book also gave me a direction for the research. Bruno Munari Design as Art Penguin Books: a Pelican Original 1971 The article the square (P. 191-195) connects to the research. It looks at the square form and its presence in human history. It reveals interesting features o f the square; the mathematical myth of the Golden Section, the multiple structural possibilities,the split game, the balanced proportion, etc. This article is a good reference on the square form. It gave me helpful information on the psychological tendencies people have for the square. Mi Fu Chinese Calligraphy 1987 This book differentiated itself from other literature talking about the art of Chinese calligraphy in that it elucidates the structure of the Chinese language from an objective viewpoint. Most Chinese authors who research the art o f calligraphy will not spend much time talking about the written language system itself because it is assumed that their audience is already familiar with the Chinese language. Without those . presumed ideas, this book is understandable for people whose native language is not Chinese. Its statement illustrates the essential nature of the calligraphy system. My project benefited from the first two chapters in this book by visually analyzing the Chinese writing language. Also, the concern for the audience helped me in organizing the project. 17 Process Language Feature Study In these two years, I got used to comparing English and Chinese written language. Although they have the same function as means of communication, there are a lot of differences between them. English is a phonetic language, 26 letters are the basic elements. Words are comprised of a certain amount of letters in a line, which have variable length. The space between words leaves an irregular arrangement of windows in English text. The writing and reading direction for the English sentences is from left to right, up to down. Chinese is a pictographic language, originating from drawn pictures used to describe things. When it was finally modified into a square character, common words turned out to be word roots. Those roots represent parts that make up more complicated words. Chinese words fit in the same size square form, providing flexibility in reading direction. In fact, reading direction has changed from time to time in the last century. Order of writing is also an important part of the Chinese language. The stroke is the basic element of the character. Within a square structure, order in writing strokes is more than left to right, up to down should be also considered. Contrast in size should be also mentioned. The construction of the Chinese characters is considerably denser than the English words, with all the strokes forming words inside a square, rather than setting in a line. In color, square characters are darker and more difficult to read than English words in the same size. Squares always serve as templates for characters. They set frames for both writers and readers. Depending on the feature of the Chinese character, the project was constituted of five parts: construction, proportion, direction, order, and frames. 19 Square Form Study As I studied the square, I found that it had various applications in human history. It has provided the proportions of famous ancient cities and of modem buildings; it generated the study about the Golden Section and the logarithmic spiral; also, it has given birth to ancient games that are still played today. In this thesis, I want to use it as a visual language, which serves as a medium to explain the Chinese written language to the Western audience, and later introduce the English typography to the Eastern audience. The first thing I determined was whether the square could be the visual language to communicate. I gathered 10 samples of the applications of the square form, five Eastern and five Western in two groups. I did so in order to reveal the differences between Eastern and Western meanings as squares. The Western group included: the title fonts by William Morrison, the geometry study by Euclid, the constructivism by El Lissitzky, German grid in typeface design, and the plan of Telesterion at Eleusis. The Eastern counterpart includes: the Coin of Chin, the traditional seal, the game of tangrams, the first compass ever made, and the game Wei. I marked out all the squares red, and left the black outlined objects to blend with the gray background. The Eastern group was presented in decreasing size order, whereas the Western group was in increasing size order. It became my visual presentation of the pre-research. I categorized the general functions of the square after carefully analyzing the applications from both sides. With considerably small size, the square serves as an element of a construction, as in the architecture plan o f Telesterion on the Western side and the coin design on the Eastern side. Sometimes, the square was considered to be a static template, providing balance by embracing complicated forms, as in the title fonts by William Morrison and the Eastern traditional seal. When deemed as a facet, people were also fascinated by the idea of dissecting the square, as in the German grid for typeface and the game of tangrams. So far, the function of the square form was shared by both Western and Eastern cultures. However, the two sides still had their unique qualities. Westerners have the legacy in studying the relationships between the square and the other forms, as in the study of El Lissitzky, or relating it with an abstract theory in geometry. For Eastern people, the square was usually iconized as eight points, four comers and four sides, as demonstrated in the design of compass and the game Wei. In this thesis, the square serves as a visual language to communicate with Western people in order to explain an Eastern language to them. Its functions were utilized in this study. The functions of the square are square as an element, the square template, and the square's tendency to be dissected. Methodology Six layouts were made. Respectively they featured construction, proportion, direction, order, and frames of the Chinese written language. The last layout reinforced the unique construction of the character. The poster was chosen as the final format because its large scale brought the strongest impact to the audience. Furthermore, the 20 21 scale of the posters was designed to have a connection with the square. Construction I: square as an element (30' x 30') This layout was aimed to communicate that the construction of a Chinese character is always within the square shape, and that the square is an important root of the character. In the layout of Construction I, the square canvas was split into four even parts. Color balance was a concern that indicated the process of the construction of the Chinese characters. It also provided the audience with a smooth, flowing visual route. A set of characters, which all contain the specific square root, was put in each part. Then each set was modified. Following the visual route, the characters were substituted with square forms, and the square roots were emphasized. I then showed the characters without the square roots and the way to split square characters. See Figure 10. n PI 1=1 Sc pg mm w P f & IQ nijj BBf o® p$ JB w? H m m n$ Figure 10 Construction I Construction II: square as an element GO' x 42') Construction II was also explained the construction and the square root of the Chinese characters. However, it addresses the character with a more abstract form than the former layout. In Construction II, the characters with square roots were simplified as a square within another square. Thus, the position of the roots in different characters were drawn in parallel and compared. See Figure 11 : mb. Ml-- ' n I □ S H U S H - HE B M Figure 11 Construction II Proportion: square template (30'x 90') This layout emphasizes the importance of size in the Chinese language. As a result of the dense construction, legibility is an important concern in the Chinese letterpress. Compared to English, whose legible limit is normally lOpt, the minimum size in Chinese is 16pt. Legibility will lessen with reduction in size. When size is reduced to a certain limit, legibility no longer exists and characters will be identical to little squares in gray scale. This feature was exaggerated through a process of imposing the characters into a template with square as the basic element. Larger sized characters were set as a contrast and the gray scale was referenced on the left. See Figure 12. 23 ■ a ■ ■ m s a ■ □ □ □ a s «♦ H * □ ■ ■ ■ ■ m a m ■ ■ □ □ □ □ m w m W m ■ ■ ■ a ■ a a m m ■ □ □ □ □ # IS m * m * » m « □ □ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ m ■ a s ■ □ □ □ ■ □ □ □ □ ■ m « W m «* ■ 9 □ □ □ □ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ a m m a m □ □ □ □ n □ □ □ □ • m m * * ■ i* * * □ □ □ □ □ Figure 12 Proportion Direction: square template (30' x 30') The flexibility of the Chinese characters in reading direction was always a unique feature of this language. Here the square was used to illustrate the direction readers usually follow. Vertical lines consisted of squares that were gradually changed spacing from 40pt to Opt, while horizontal spacing was enlarged in the other direction. Thus, the vertical reading direction became horizontal. It indicated the fact that the flexible square template needed the most concern. Chinese writers might not necessarily be aware of the spacing between lines. But this spacing is of most importance to the readers. See Figure 13. 24 8 ..-M. [ J k '- ■ o ft MsL A □ Figure 13 Direction Order: square template and its tendency to be dissected GO' x 30,s) Writing the Chinese characters was a process that could be analyzed with the building process o f the traditional square template in writing. In this layout, the two processes converged into the conventional writing palette in Chinese. Then the square template was dissected purposely. When the square was broken down into eight event parts, the character was broken as well. This layout was a result from the study of the square's tendency to be dissected. Since Chinese characters are all designed in square templates. The experiment to dissect them along with the division of the square form came into being. See Figure 14. 25 Figure 14 Order Frame: the tendency o f square to be dissected (30' x 42') The square always plays an important role in the framing of the Chinese characters. Paradoxically, the Chinese characters framed by the square actually modify the square as well. In most circumstances, Chinese characters were written in dark color within a light square background. In this layout, I created negative space in square blocks by inverting the color of the character and the square. Enlarging the character in the dark square until it bled off the edges, the square was broken into abstract shapes. This layout was supposed to communicate the theme of "break the square." I chose the character meaning "I" to encourage myself to break the rules. See Figure 15. 26 legible I m m Z Figure 15 Frame Presentation The presentation was still attached to the theme "break the square." Most of the works were hung from the ceiling. They split the space in the gallery. Audiences were led through the route from my initial study to the final creative project. Evaluation This exhibit was a typographic presentation in the gallery. Facing a foreign language, people tried to connect the visual impact with their understanding. In the process, each individual saw unique things. This included becoming more familiar with the existence of the square form in language and thinking about the various ways communication could be presented. My initial purpose for this exhibit was aimed at introducing people to a foreign language by using the form of a square as a visual medium. I intended to educate the audience through examining the design process of square forms. However, the actual process people were looking at during the exhibit was initiated from the English perspective. Because of this, the experiment "from form to language" has not yet reached its original goal. It showed me the power o f language. Visual communication is not successful without literacy in that particular language. On the other hand, I wonder what the Chinese audience would think if the exhibit was held in China. Could the Chinese be educated on the idea of typography with this exhibition? I will have to find out in the future. Conclusion The creative project explored new methods in visual communication. In explaining the Chinese written language system, which few audiences understand, I used the familiar square form. In other words, communication was built through a bridge referring to the square. Further Direction This exhibit reveals a way of exploring the Chinese language with Western graphic design approaches. Following this direction, I will do more research on the similarities between English and Chinese, in order to look for proper typographic experiments that are translatable to the Chinese audience, whose knowledge about graphic design, especially typography, is still considerably vague. Also, I plan to utilize the unique features of the Chinese language, explored in the square study, to look for new approaches to Chinese typography. 28 APPENDIX LAYOUTS IN THE EXHIBITION "BREAK THE SQUARE" 30 31 32 C N J ♦ 34 35 lilifi,. is Hi! H I -s J I i I fit |;i*l 5 * * I * 1 ! 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