99 ways
Stuart Bailey, talking about a recent worksop at USC, california. Using Georges Perec’s system of the Exercice de style, where the same action is described in 99 different writing styles, Bailey interessantly evokes this practice into Graphic design language:
“The implication of this in terms of graphic design is that any piece of work could be designed in (at least) 99 different ways, using a graphic vocabulary rather than a textual one (or, obviously, both). I’m interested in learning, or teaching, how to be able to recognize and use those different styles in a manner appropriate to each new piece of work, starting from zero every time. That’s exactly what graphic design and modernism mean to me. The sort of work I like and aspire to make is based on this pluralism, intelligently drawing from the whole spectrum of style rather than sticking to one slavishly.”