Ugly Design - Grunge Posters

Last week's lecture series focused heavily on revolutionary design practices from the 90s which turned traditional approaches and etiquette on their head to create entirely original visual aesthetics which celebrate the author and the emotions they wish to embed into their work.

The outer two posters were created on Illustrator with a focus on text manipulation to push the bounds of legibility within typographical posters. While these turned out well, upon reflection their final outcome feels too derivative and ultimately ignores the very message behind the movement.

The middle poster, created on photoshop, is the result of this realisation and as such deviates from the traditional ugly aesthetic, drawing elements from slasher graphics, totalitarian imagery and arbitrary dot texturing seen on all types of posters. The result, after playing extensively with blend modes, is a disturbing yet highly stylised poster which, while more legible than the previous two, conveys a confusingly cohesive personality through the ugly fusion of multiple visual styles that just so happened to catch my eye at the time.