Form and Content 4 (1990s)

This is a piece created by David Carson. It is composed mainly of black and white, with a little bit of red up in the corner. The red text is in a clogged typewriter looking typeface. There is a lot of commotion and traffic in the bottom of the piece, and the red name up at the top is a way to bring the viewers attention away from that, without putting an overemphasis on it. There is more of that typewriter like font that is placed either in black squared with white letters, or white squares with black letters. These give contrast and also play with the negative and positive space. There are lots of layers of different sized words and letters in-between the two squares which serve to create a texture and also play off of the overall message and content of the piece. The piece reads "don't mistake legibility for communication" which is a powerful message to the graphic design world. This message is reemphasized through Carson's graphic abstractions. The fact that the "legibility" is broken up on the textured black surface of the repeated message helps to break the viewers thought process while they're reading the message. They have to stop and think about it for a minute, which is exactly what the message is trying to say. Even though you can read the message after concentrating for awhile, that doesn't mean you are communicating it. The piece is very clean and visually interesting. The combination of the negative and positive space playing off of each other helps to create a good balance throughout the piece.