February 2017 – Najiha Puteri

In summary, this project is about Typography. We have to create our own fonts, and use that for our names. We have to create it in such a way that it reflects a job that we want to have in the future.

I made use of Bahaus movement as part of my references. The simple use of Sans Serif, and the lines, basic shapes (trianges, circles and squares) are art of the trademarks of that movement. Kassily Kandinsky, a Bahaus artist is one that inspired me to make use of simple lines, and play around with them to make out a typeface.

I have little background on using digital softwares, so I had to rely on my drawing skills. Other mediums used are water colour and pen. And some photoshop in terms of scaling.

The following are in order, and my final pieces are right at the end of each order.

1) Writer
2) Mother/ Babysitter
3) Zookeeper
4) Performer

380694165900b4d7de91b9d26cc485c0 — Taken from Pinterest. The use of simple lines and and placement of the lines portrays the feather-ink pen that was used back in the day. It is not literal but by looking at this, the form is there.

©Alan Magee "Portrait of Hannah Hch," 1992 Digital photomontage on dye sub paper 10 x 8 inches, Private collection — ©Alan Magee
“Portrait of Hannah Hch,” 1992
Digital photomontage on dye sub paper
10 x 8 inches, Private collection

5a352e9a62431ddd7ab0734595615cb5 — I was advised to use pen nibs, papers, writing fonts, and typewriter to show the job as a writer. Eventually I used this for later work.

Tried Hannah Hoch for this portrait. It was a lot of work to cut out and paste, but the outcome was ok, I guess. It doesn’t match the job as poet/writer.

At first, I wanted to work on poet. So I kind of explored the use of llipstick and used pen to show words “falling” out of a mouth. Like a sea of water gushing out of a person’s mouth. And lips being sewn together as well.

Again, working on “poet”. Drew words on the “water” falling out. It turned out a bit weird.

Final Product:

1) Writer
2) Mother/ Babysitter
3) Zookeeper
4) Performer

Artist references:

Ji Lee (South Korean communications + graphic designer)

playful with use of letters, match up with meaning
simple fonts, but bolded
Credits to Ji Lee for his work

This was before I knew what Typography was all about lol. It was some first skteches I made to show mother.

Trying out water colour to paint a realistic picture of a preganant belly. The message would be clearer, as told by a classmate.

I was told the baby crib (1) does not speak “mother” . Instead it was babysitter. The 2nd one was not obvious, as told by others. I thought the “j” would show a person cradling a newborn, but it wasn’t obvious. Someone told me the “j” looks more like an alien lol

Adding baby crib to connect the idea of baby to mother. But I was advised that this could be seen as “babysitter” not “mother”.

1) Writer
2) Mother/ Babysitter
3) Zookeeper
4) Performer

8804125e8b116243a8a1e9e6067832f8 — Negative space

1) Writer
2) Mother/ Babysitter
3) Zookeeper
4) Performer

After showing the previous clip to class, I was given some feedback to work on it. It’s mainly characterization and adding of clips, and also following the pace of the intro. Some liked to fast pace of the clips so they recommended it. On the other hand, the alter ego I potrayed was relevant but needed more scenes to portray her 100%. The alter ego is basically a lady who works full time yet manages to keep up with her role as a housewife/mother, as portrayed in kitchen. I had to add scenes of her ironing her working clothes + switching off gas pipes + receiving phone texts from her.

A peer recommended me this local literature play called Emily of the Emerald Hill. I only watched the above video to get a gist of what Emily, this middle-aged yet youthful looking Peranakan lady, is all about. Judging from the clip itself, she comes off as a rather, brash, outspoken and very expressive with her words and thoughts. I noticed her body language spoke more about this character much more than what she’s talking about. The flamboyant, yet feminine hand gestures, the dramatic rolling of eyes, the primadonna behavior and eye movement all made her someone as wanting to be in the spotlight ( figuratively).

I would put in some body language gestures and expression to show the alter ego in my video.

“Be the very devil of your wife and mother.. Bind them, wrap them… The husband, the son and the daughter-in-law must all depend on you, so YOU can control them… So the whole world knows your worth! “
– Emily of The Emerald Hill

Besides the feedback, I worked on making a piece of background noise to fit the video.

Month: February 2017

2D: Typography

Alter Ego: “Batu Lesung”- Feedback + New Scenes