Bauhaus Design

Bauhaus Shapes & Colors

Bauhaus Wassily Kandinsky assigned primary colors red, yellow, and blue to the shapes squares, triangles, and circles respectively. I kept the colors for the squares and triangles but switched the color for the circles from blue to green. This is because I felt like circles are a harmonious shape and green is a good soothing color to represent this.

When I was creating this, I had the ‘Build To Order (BTO)’ policy of Singapore in mind. I found it unusual and unsettling that the citizens would have to decide a future with a partner 5 years before it happens. I felt like a life changing decision like this should be given more freedom. In addition, I am concerned that at a certain age, some people will be more focused on finding a person to share a BTO with rather than their life. Some people would end up settling down with someone even if they do not match.

The red box made by squares represents the person or their personal boundaries. The green circles represent who they are as a person. The yellow triangle represent them putting up a persona or their best self to find a partner. It also represents wariness. The yellow background helps exaggerate the wariness of a person seeking someone to share a BTO.

Art Nouveau Design

Art Nouveau Design

Out of the two assignment choices, I chose option (A) which was to create a Art Nouveau style abstract pattern inspired by a nature photograph. I chose to do this because I was intrigued by the ornamental decorations of Art Nouveau. Although it uses organic shapes and curves, it manages to maintain a structure and pattern.

 

Inspiration

Photo taken at Gangneung, South Korea

This photo was taken when I visited Gangneung with my family. We stopped by the road to see the ocean. The voluminous curves of the cloud and the diagonal line that the cloud and seagulls create caught my attention.

 

Sketches

I wanted to incorporate both the clouds and seagulls.
For the clouds, I wanted to focus on:
1) organic shape and curves
2) how it forms straight horizontal lines
3) the diagonal line it creates as it becomes bigger in the photograph

For the seagulls, I liked their random repeated placements.

I felt like these factors could come together to encompass the ornamental characteristics of Art Nouveau that combines both geometric and organic shapes.

From an expat’s point of view, Singapore seems to have a mixture of traditional and modern factors in addition to so many different cultures and religions. For instance, I would see a modern space pod hotel right next to a Hindu temple. So I wanted my Art Nouveau reinterpretation to be a mixture of traditional, modern, and cultures like Singapore as well.

For the shape of the clouds, I was inspired by the traditional East Asian representation. I brought the clouds together to form a diamond. The diamond shape is inspired by the Indonesian tiles along the road especially near shop houses in areas like Tiong Bahru. Furthermore, I find the nature in Singapore to be organized and planned out. The nature I see seems to be carefully placed in a specific location to fit the structure of the whole city. Thus, I used green for the organic shapes to represent the nature and greenery as well as place them in a tile format to represent structure.

In addition, I randomly placed S curves in my design to represent the element of chance and seagulls. I chose pink for this curves to show the funky side of Singapore where different elements will come together to create something new.

 

Final Product