Art Jam Poster
Ivy Tech's Art Jam competition is aimed at high school students enrolled at Southern Indiana, Metro Louisville public/private high schools or college preparatory schools who happen to have an interest in the visual arts. Students can use a variety of mediums to create a piece of art work based around a specific topic for a chance to win a scholarship at Ivy Tech Southern Indiana. Our task was to design a poster (front and back) that could be sent to and hung up at local high schools within the area.
The topic for the 2013 Art Jam was "space" and the poster I designed was made to reflect that in multiple ways. I came up with the concept for the poster by drawing inspiration and elements from band posters (such as Blink-182). The fist bursting through the paper was one of the first and strongest concepts I originally had. I wanted to make the poster interesting and something that high school students may think as visually interesting.
Front
The CMYK color scheme used for most of the poster was a callback to the bright and vibrant colors of both punk band posters and an 80s pop feel. The colors work as an eye-catcher but it's the fist that draws attention. The fist not only defies the space of the poster but also creates the focal point that leads to the rest of the title. Also of note is the missing pinky finger, creating not only another space but a bit of a story and mystery.
Back
The x-acto cutting knife lends an iconic art/design symbol to the poster and the sliced-off pinky continues the story started from the front of the poster. The knife and pinky also tell an all too familiar story for those of us that have used x-acto knives. Since this was going to be read by high school students, I wanted the text-heavy back to also be interesting. I used the various colors, font sizes, the images, and the sloping of the knife to make the back interesting and to draw attention to it.