This project was a creative exercise exploring form through letters. The objective was to create a visually engaging piece without creating formative meaning.

This requirement of abstraction had some specific effects. The elements of each piece could only be made up of unmodified, uniformly scaled letters: no shapes or pathfinding trickery were permitted. Rather than relying on the written meaning of each letter, letters were treated as abstract shapes within a square canvas. The piece could not be made to resemble a physical, real life form, either. The end result for each piece had to be an abstract form that was visually interesting completely on its own.

First it was necessary to select two typefaces and five letters. There had to be engaging contrast between the forms of not just each typeface, but each letter. Each end piece had to use two unique forms of the same letter. Each piece had to be a pairing of either the same typeface with different casing, same casing with different typefaces, or different selections for both casing and typeface. No pieces could rely on only one form of the selected letter.

With this in mind, contrasting selections was determined to be critical. Contrasting typefaces would equate to flexible possibilities in the long run, like having both rulers and french curves in a toolbox. A semi-bold Gill Sans Nova and an italic Baskerville URW suited this task nicely. They were interesting forms in their own right, but seemed to make for a flexible set as well.

A, G, Q, R, and T were selected as the letters to utilize. These letters appeared to be balanced between being visually interesting and practical to work with.

Early on, I decided to focus the bulk of my efforts towards abstract patterns and solutions that generally occupied more of the canvas space. Solutions that had minimized occupied canvas space or otherwise used less forms were the more popular solution to this exercise, and it seemed that patterning and denser solutions were unexplored at this time. The unexplored choice, however, struck me as more engaging and novel.

That said, due diligence was given towards the more conventional solution, and indeed they were appealing in their own right. While the patterned approach was generally more even, the minimal approach had a distinct sense of visual weight skewing in a particular direction as well as a sense of distinct abstract forms.

Q was the last letter pairing to substantially explore patterns and denser solutions. Aside from the desire to create a diverse exploration of possibilities, the conventional solution had a practical aspect to it: such solutions took distinctly less time to execute. If R and T were to be properly explored, it was necessary to use strategies that were as time efficient as they were visually interesting.

It was decided by this stage to focus efforts on solutions that were light. Pieces that came out of this stage were at times as light as two forms only. It was difficult to work with each letter in such a way that minimized how recognizable they were, but the pieces that came out of this stage were some of the most visually striking.

What made these final, lighter solutions striking had to due with the characteristics mentioned previously regarding the conventional approach to this exercise: the minimal presence of forms made the few that were present that much stronger. Their visual weight, center, and structure made a bigger impact precisely because of their singular presence on the canvas.

I do not think they would've been as successful however if they were the approach I started out with or if I followed the exercise convention. In a sense, I found that convention stale. Starting out on the other end had me in the interesting position that by the time I started considering more conventional pieces, it was as if I was approaching the convention from another, more novel end of it.

The final five pieces reflect a diverse range of approaches to the exercise, all of which strong for their own formal qualities.