BARE Magazine Issue 31: Terrain
For BARE Magazine’s 31st issue, I worked with fellow Creative Director, Sofia Viglucci, and Art Directors, Isaiah Acosts and Greta Charness, to conceptualize and execute a cohesive issue that is true to our brand, indicative of the moment, and reflective of our goals for the magazine.
i31 Concept Step 1: Theme
We imagine Terrain as a mental and physical playground, a place to be curious and rough. With this theme, we explore the body, mind, and environment as personal and collective terrain in an effort to return home to ourselves and each other.
i31 Concept Step 2: Brand Identity
Our typeface invokes simplicity and modernism. The typeface of American 20th century terrain, Helvetica populates public infrastructure, becoming second nature in our visual landscape. Helvetica is safe and comes “naturally” but is simultaneously brutal in its juxtaposition with organic, natural forms.
Hand-written pull quotes talk back to Helvetica’s disciplined and supposed simplicity. Here, we play with the relationship between objectivity and subjectivity through hand and keyboard. A similar juxtaposition can be observed through the color scheme of black, white, and earthtones.
i31 Concept Step 3: Photo ContentFour photo projects address the theme of Terrain.
1. Exoskeleton sees the body as a physical site of action and a material to be molded. Curious about the desire to create and know oneself through the body, we photographed ballerinas and boxers in their chosen setting. We saw from each subject how the body becomes both the tool and the product of an athlete’s work in producing/reproducing themself and mastering their craft.
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2. Dwellings ponders personal terrain through photographing Berkeley residents in the privacy of their homes--their spaces of groundedness. We focus specifically on observing the manifestations of one’s inner life in their domestic space, a physical representation of emotional and psychological terrain.
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3. Sum of its Parts shot organic objects, the small pieces that make up our everyday terrain. In this shoot, we were interested in understanding the environment as we do the body, an accumulation of vital organs, systems, and symbiotic relationships.
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4. Lastly, Summer Teeth frames terrain as a children’s world, a landscape untamed, scrappy, and unformed. Blacktop, pavement, forest floor, and backyard--these are places to stumble and crash. They are forever spaces of early discovery and confrontation.
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