Archive

Creative & Art Direction + Graphic Design + Photography & Videography

One of four promotional videos. Directed, shot and edited by me. Sound on!

“As we write our story, we write our history…”

This became the unofficial tagline for the Advertising + Graphic Design Fall 2024 Portfolio Show, ARCHIVE, of which I served as Creative and Art Director.

While brief, this sentence captures the primary idea that informed me while conceptualizing ARCHIVE—the idea that all that we do quickly becomes what we’ve done. Our presents—these live and active moments and experiences—instantaneously become our pasts. As we each navigate our lives, we contribute to “archives”, both our own and those of every other that we impact.

We are constantly crafting, editing and arranging collections of records and data that inform who we currently are, and tell of where we’ve been.

Character

ARCHIVE is all about capturing and preserving live moments and action. Aesthetically, it relies heavily on human intervention, and thus carries an unpolished, raw, often chaotic visual character. A key visual tool became handwritten annotations, which both allowed our unique marks (handwriting conveying our ideas) to be fully displayed and created the very active, undone aesthetic that was intended.

Part of the invitation design, featuring my handwriting.

Primary logo.

Sweet Sans Pro + my handwriting.

Aptly, ARCHIVE was born from messy word maps.

Actualization

Throughout ARCHIVE, there is an emphasis on tactile media and tangible experiences. The show’s primary promotional materials—invitations and print posters invitations (pictured below)—were multidimensional, containing two key components each. The invitation included an annotated letter that articulates the ideas and inspiration behind ARCHIVE, and an annotated postcard that reiterates the most vital information. Harkening to the idea of preserving for archival purposes, the postcard was placed inside a glassine sleeve—typically used for storing film reels and photographs.

Full letter.

Postcard.

Full invitation.

Not shown: vintage postage stamps.

Back of letter.

Kat’s items

Half-sheet, which was paired with the poster below.

Main poster, which was posted along with half-sheet shown above. Annotations by my cohort and me. Design and photography by me.

Actualization: Engagement

Kevin’s items

The “representative items” series was a major player in ARCHIVE’s social media campaign. Each member of my 14-person cohort selected pieces that they felt represented them most authentically. Rather our likenesses, these items would serve as our introductions to our audience on Instagram.

The series served two purposes: (1) to emphasize our individual archives by showcasing what would be included in them; and (2) to circumnavigate unconscious bias among audiences identified by previous cohorts, which showed that profiles of students that were woman-presenting and/or people of color were typically interacted with the least on both the show website and social media pages.