Russian-American Poster Throwdown
Rufus Wainwright vs. 9/11; Band of Horses vs. Chernobyl

Given the relaxation of historic political tensions between U.S. and Russia, The Seattle-Moscow Poster Show (opening September 4, 2009, Bumbershoot, Seattle) will differ from its predecessors, The Seattle-Tehran Poster Show and The Seattle-Havana Poster Show. Instead of avoiding difficult content out of necessity to protect designers in those cities, this exhibit includes posters referencing tragedies that once could have been viewed through the prism of national politics, but in reality are universal tragedies. 

One example is a poster by Anna Naumova and Igor Gurovich (two-thirds of the design studio Ostengruppe) for the Sergei Kuryokhin International Festival (SKIF) in 2002. Executed shortly after September 11, 2001, the poster for an experimental Moscow music festival presents a typographic silhouette of the twin World Trade Center towers in New York with a crudely drawn airplane hitting the first tower.

The image was shocking to me when I discovered it. It seemed odd that a Russian designer would employ the image as advertising for anything. As an American, I realized I felt a sense of ownership over this disturbing image burned into our national psyche on 9/11.

I had the opportunity to visit Ostengruppe’s office in Moscow in February 2009 and hoped to hear directly from the designers their thoughts behind the creation of this poster. Anna Naumova’s explanation of her intent reflected the ideals that originally motivated the Seattle exhibit series. “This tragedy was not an American tragedy. This was a tragedy for the whole world.” Seen in that light, their poster is an artistic expression of grief, of compassion for those on the other side of a former political divide, not a mere music ad.

In the exhibit, the SKIF poster is paired with one by Andrio Abero, a concert poster for the artist Rufus Wainwright. Seen on its own, Abero’s poster is devoid of political content. Only when paired side-by-side with Naumova’s do the the formal similarities shift the viewer’s perception. Putting the posters together, the oversized capitol “R” for “Rufus” becomes another silhouette of the towers. The tower on the right is hit first, buckling due to the impact of the black words “Rufus Wainwright,” acting as a substitute airplane with a trail of colored typography. Pink flowers framing the artist’s name become an explosion of licking flames midway up the building. The brutal power of the imagery and the unintended connection makes it one of the most interesting combinations in the show.

Another example reveals a similar shift in perspective with an equally tragic subject matter. Yuri Sukov’s black and white poster created for the 20th anniversary of the Chernobyl nuclear disaster is paired with Mike King’s “Band of Horses” concert poster. In Sukov’s piece, two tumbling, monolithic black “X” shapes—at once roman numerals and memorial crucifixes for the dead—X-out the black plant forms woven around them. In a similar fashion a ghostly white horse falls from the sky, silhouetted by grey and dark brown plant shapes in King’s design. Placed side-by-side, the grim legacy of Chernobyl affects perception of the image—transforming the otherwise decorative Band of Horses poster into an apocalyptic vision of a dying landscape.

In 1986 I lived in West Germany and happened to be visiting a friend in northern Germany when the radioactive cloud from Chernobyl passed overhead. We were advised to stay indoors for 24 hours to avoid exposure to the approaching nuclear fallout. Not seeing what difference it would truly make, we wandered out into a warm, beautiful April morning. We witnessed a German suburban landscape suddenly still, devoid of all human activity, a hint of the apocalypse. The next I time encountered a similar stillness was the day after 9/11 when the early September sky above Seattle, normally humming with multiple jets at any given time, was suddenly dead quiet.

Daniel R. Smith is a Seattle-based designer, artist and sometimes curator. He graduated from the University of Washington in 1994 with a BFA in Graphic Design and a BA in fine arts. Currently a Creative Manager for Starbucks Coffee, he has worked for NBBJ Architecture, Experience Music Project (EMP) and Realogics. His work has been chosen for inclusion in Seattle City Light’s public art collection and Experience Music Project’s permanent collection. Curatorial projects include The Seattle-Havana Poster Show, The Seattle-Tehran Poster Show and The Seattle-Moscow Poster Show.
www.creativehotlist.com/dsmith

Recent Entries

• Sebastian Guerrini: The Social and Political Life of Images
• Stefan G. Bucher: The Monsters Made Me Do It
• Juxtaposing Cultural Identity with Progress: Mokena Makeka on “Humility Design”
• Harry Pearce’s Schizophrenic Road
• Ronald Shakespear shares his Green Wayfinding Dream
• AIGA XCD Recycles!
• It’s Springtime! New Beginnings!
• ACCESS-ABILITY Conference: Graphic Design for a More Accessible World
• Dan Formosa, Designing for Humans: the Museum Question
• Design Indaba!

This entry was posted on Sunday, May 31st, 2009 at 4:45 pm and is filed under Art, Authors, Cities & Places, Culture, Graphic Design, History, Ideas, Illustration, Other, Politics, Social Issues/Responsibility. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.