This is the key visual for the MONTREUX JAZZ FESTIVAL by French Illustrator Malika Favre. I think it’s captivating by the repetition of the female form and shows a playful side to the festival. Jazz is energetic and vibrant but she chose to use black and white to show the deep contrast between the silhouettes and the white space. In term of text, not much was used except for a small detail at the bottom left corner. Visually, people would think that it’s a dance festival but it illicit a different mood when the viewer realises it’s a jazz festival instead.

This is a poster promoting Metahaven’s WikiLeak’s fundraiser at art berlin contemporary 2012.

Metahaven is by Amsterdam based design/art collective that creates visual design that is subversive and deliberately breaks the convention of contemporary graphic design where things are clean and visually direct.

The design for the poster present is much more politically charged than it seems. Apart from promoting the event itself with the use of text for the details, the word Wikileaks and the Macbook’s spinning rainbow are seemingly clouded and obscured or torn out. Visually, it is very different from the usual and it makes the viewer feel curious. The use of imagery is simple although unconventional. It literally means, Wikileaks is in limbo, and the image does feel like it is “leaking”.

Comparing the two, they take very different approaches. The former being more clear-cut, fun and takes the risk of not using direct images relating to jazz but more of evoking a feeling, and the latter being more subversive, politically-charged, and questions the audience in linking the visuals mentally before reading the text. Both are very appealing but maybe not for Singapore.