The Hangul Exhibit
The UC Davis Design Museum is currently showcasing a work exploring the beauty and function of good typography. The Hangul exhibit, which is open until December 6, 2009, is a collection of paintings in which typography is the main inspiration. According to the design museum website, the exhibit:
…presents the work of two designers whose typographic roots began in Hangul, the native script of Korea.
The fact that the exhibit is all in Hangul allows non-native viewers like myself to appreciate the aesthetics of the script without the meaning of the words influencing it. Good design can sometimes get lost in translation when its meaning is somewhat distasteful. Look at graffiti artists; their distinct, and sometimes confusing, form of typography is unappreciated mainly due to its connotations with vandalism.
Some people might ignore the good typography in this painting aptly named Fuck, by David Franzese, just because of the obscenity. A non-English speaker could look at this and recognize its value.
For those who are truly curious about what the paintings signify, the museum has provided a short description for each piece. Reading about the paintings definitely adds another dimension to what you are viewing. The painting in this post’s title image is a typographic exploration of a Korean song entitled Ileona, or Stand Up. The song’s chorus “Stand up like spring sprouts and try it again” is represented as the characters literally standing up from the page. The words themselves become the inspiration for others to signify it. A technique found also in René Magritte’s works, in which words alter a viewer’s perspective.
The Design Museum is located in Walker Hall on the UC Davis campus and is open Mondays through Fridays from 12pm to 4pm and Sundays from 2pm to 4 pm.
