The University of Tasmania's third collaborative event with Dark MOFO featured twelve installations by Art, Music, Theatre and Performance students at the Centre for the Arts, as
part of the 2019 Winter Festival. Each artwork was hosted behind the ground floor windows, showcasing live creative performances that responded to grand allegories of indulgence, sin, revelry or apocalypse, with reference to Hieronymus Bosch’s titular painting:
The Garden of Earthly Delights.
I was recruited to join a team of five third year designers for the purposes of establishing a graphical identity for Panopticon III, which opened the doors to a world of obstacles and an
ocean of opportunity.
ocean of opportunity.
Together, we developed a colour thematic similar to Dark MOFO's; preserving the classic ruby hues at first, but steering towards the lighter end of the spectrum to visibly separate the branding from the other events. Playing on the symmetry of the festivals tree-like emblem, we constructed
a geometric typeface following a triangular grid - this originally caused strife amongst the team,
as there were balancing issues with the T and I letterforms, which I resolved by breaking the grid optically to give the impression of alignment.
a geometric typeface following a triangular grid - this originally caused strife amongst the team,
as there were balancing issues with the T and I letterforms, which I resolved by breaking the grid optically to give the impression of alignment.
As the project moved along, the team decided to deviate from the classic 'MOFO aesthetic and began to experiment with minimalistic collage (specifically of Hieronymus Bosch’s paintings), settling on a desaturated overlay effect to reference Panopticon's cardinal concept of 'looking in
or out through glass windows.'
or out through glass windows.'
With the final visual qualities ironed out, I was tasked with producing the assets required for the University's website and Facebook page, in line with the brands style.
Another element that I was involved in with two other members was the creation and installation of transparent fabric stickers, which were adhered to the Entrépot Gallery's gridded windows. The whole surface was backlit with an animated projection to create a gloomy, mercurial glow, and drew quite a lot of attention from the Hobart Waterfront, from where it shone like a beacon.
The timeliest component of the brand was undoubtedly the posters. Many iterations were formed but not a lot were chosen to feature the event. In the end we decided that the below three versions were the strongest and were thus posted everywhere...
We also never expected these posters to cause the biggest maintenance issue as well; it turned out that members of the public had an unusually avid tendency to steal them quite often...
Our pride was definitely the labels. They were printed on the same material as the stock used for the Entrépot windows and allowed us to illuminate each artwork. We were able to achieve a sense of cohesion and continuity between all the installations because of them.
I was left in charge of maintaining the stickers and lights, and was lucky enough on my rounds to overhear fleeting compliments on how well everything worked together.
