Contextual Research
Romek
Marber
Romek
Marber communicates
visually and searches for clarity. In his work he uses type, drawing, and
photography. The subject matter influences the tools he uses.
Romek
Marber studied at St Martin’s School of Art, studying commercial Arts. Commercial
Arts entailed: drawing from life, creating graphical pictures, and tracing
letterforms from type books. This then lead to Studying at Royal College of
Art, in Graphic Design.
After
Marber’s education, he started working for ‘The Economist’ and ‘New Society
magazine’. The Economist cover had running text and no pictures. The printing
was done through letterpress, with the limitation of two colours, red and
black. The Economist worked with short deadlines, therefore Marber worked with
speed and punctuality. When working for New Society magazine, Marber had a lot more
time. The art director at the time was Richard Hollis. During this time period
there was no technical programmers such as Photoshop, Illustrator, and no
digital cameras therefore the design process took more time which was required.
Working
for Penguin Books
In
1960, Germano Facetti, art director of Penguin Books, noticed Marber’s covers
for The Economist. Therefore, got in touch with Marber asking to design the
cover for Penguins book. The first cover Marber designed was with Simeon Potter, the cover for ‘Our Language and
Language in the Modern World’. The message in Our Language conveys the
evolvement in English language. The contextual approach is through the union
Jack to signify that our language is the English language. This message of evolvement
is through the title being out of focus to suggest this cycle.
After
designing Language in the Modern World, Marber was asked to submit a proposal
for a cover design applied to the Penguin Crime series.
Penguin
Crime Grid
The Penguin
grid was created by Marber to create a visual similar identity to all the
penguin crime books. The grid allows positioning for green and white areas. It
also positions the layout of typography and image towards the cover. By June,
Marber was asked to create twenty titles by the month October. The theme of the
Penguins was carried through this grid system aswell as using dark imagery. The
launch of these new designs of the penguin books were successful. The grid
helped control the rational of each design cover. The concept of unity towards
dark imagery addressed the context of Crime.
The imagery
used was through photography. The idea of the dark imagery created a creepy
feel towards the Crime series. The grid also reflects flexibility of where
white areas were placed without effecting the style.
The book ‘The
Night of Wenceslas’ by Lionel Davidson is about a man being chased in the
streets of Prague. To create the idea of a broken up image was through the
technique of ribbed glass. The ideology of looking through the glass, people
would appear sliced up. This concept was also used for ‘The Case of the Turning
Tide’ by Erle Stanley to resemble reflection of a face in turning tide.
The company
Penguin decided to create each cover to be individual for each author. Therefore,
Marber modified his artwork by adding small white figures appearing in
different positions on each cover.
The work
for the Penguin Crime books then lead to other work offers. One example was for
Queen magazine. The imagery was again about crime.
After this,
Marber worked with George Simenon fiction books. Marber created the front covers
based on the Penguin Crime grid system. The Penguin company had one rule; of
placing the penguin logo on the right side of the cover. Instead of using
photography and collage, Marber used his drawing ability. The six fiction novels
were based in France, therefore used the French three colour flag: red, blue,
and white.
Final Book covers for George Simenon fiction books.
Researching into Penguin Books
The Case of the
Caretakers cat
Peter Baxter wanted to test the loyalty of his heritors.
Baxter had the plan with Hing to pretend to cutting all of them out and leaving
the estate to his caretaker, James Hing. The Siamese cat in the story belonged
to James Hing. The plan was to burn down the Baxter’s house and replace his
body with a medical cadaver to make the heritors believe he was dead. If anyone
contested the will they will be disinherited. However, the
dead body found was Peter Baxter. Therefore, one of the heirs overheard
Baxter plan, the question is who was it?
The Night of Wenceslas
Nicolas is the main character, he lives a day to day live
where he works for his late father’s glass making business. He hates his job where
he works for Nimek. He dreams of inheriting money from his rich Uncle Bela In Vancouver,
which will end his current problems.
Nicolas is told from a lawyer, Stephen Cunliffe, that his
Uncle Belahas died and left a fortune. He spends the money within days. Therefore,
Nicolas discusses a stable income from the fortune left.
However, Cunliffe reveals that Uncle Bela is alive and in
fact Cunliffe is a moneylender. All the money which is spent is owed back to
Cunliffe. Nicolas distraught at this point, is told he can owe this money back
if he follows a simple assignment in Prague. He is to bring
back certain formulae for glass-making processes from a glass factory that used
to belong to Pavelka.
Nicolas travels to
Prague. Nicolas then finds out he is a part of an international plot, where he
has to find his way through random events to find his way home.
The Maltese Falcon
Private
investigates, Sam Spade and Miles Archer meet a client Ruth Wonderly, as she
claims she is looking for her missing sister who is involved with a man called
Floyd Thursby, who she is about to meet. Archer agreed to go with Wonderly to
meet up with Thursby. Archer and Thursby both had been murdered that evening. When
interviewing, Wonderly has checked out of her hotel. Archer’s widow Iva believes
Spade shot his partner.
Spade
questions Wonderly, she explains Thursby was her partner and killed Archer but
she is not aware who killed Thursby. Spade is unconvinced from this story. At
the end, it is revealed that Wonderly confesses to killing Archer. Despite
Spade’s feelings towards her, gives her up to the police.
Production
Production
The Case of the Caretaker's cat
The design focuses on a more illustrative approach, to address my style of working. The style of y illustrations apply a dreamy style. The swirls are inspired by fire to represent the fire that happened in the story.
The feedback received was perhaps adapt a dark background to create more of a crime feel. The style perhaps suggest fantasy rather than crime. To develop the design further, perhaps include collage of the will in the book. This could be collaged into the cat or could be adapted into a background.
The Night of Wenceslas
Using the medium of charcoal to relate to Romek Marber's chose of medium. It also creates a dark mysterious approach to the imagery. The use of collage reflects the idea of a collection and journey which the character explores. The imagery is a landscape of Prague where the character is running and ends up.
The feedback given is to create a better refined drawing approach as the drawing doesn't look refined. However the composition layout works well. The postcard imagery could be developed further and this could be created more of a concept to address meaning and purpose towards the design.
The Maltese Falcon
The illustration is of the main character Miss Wonderley. The medium used is ink to relate to the sadness and heartache of the story. The character looks puzzled and lost to relate to her feelings within the story. The gris is used applying a centred composition. It is minimalistic to address the suspense in the story.
The feedback given is to develop the illustrations further by drawing more characters within the book and apply that onto the back cover. The back cover could be developed further by applying more imagery. A background could be applied to create more interest. The use of photomontage would work effectively by using the Marber grid more.
No comments:
Post a Comment