Typography is a huge part in all three VisCom areas - photography, illustration and graphic design. Text can put a piece into context, and gear the viewer's mind into the right direction.
Waihnin Pwint Thon, pictured
James Mackay is a British freelance documentary photographer. His project, entitled "Even Though I'm Free, I Am Not", is a collection of photographs and interviews of former Burmese political prisoners - many of whom have had to flee their home country - to raise the awareness of the brutal conditions suffered by fellow political prisoners who are still incarcerated. Amnesty International, inspired by his work, collaborated with Mackay to turn his photography into a worldwide campaign.
The simplistic gesture of holding the right hand up to the camera is that of the Abhaya Mudra - a Buddhist symbol of peace, protection and fearlessess. In writing the name of a fellow political prisoner on that hand, it becomes a symbol of standing in solidarity with that person, and silent protest. When seeing the image, no verbal description is really needed - the image says all. I find the campaign to be extremely powerful, and strongly aided by that small use of text.
How does no text affect the context or emotion of a piece?
To see a photograph, an illustration, a graphic - really, any piece of art - without text, the first time you look at it, you'll just see what is there (obviously). There's no annotations or text applying to the image to sway you, you're left to make your own decisions. Above is a piece that has attracted some controversy and had the label of 'not real art' applied to it - Tracey Emin's My Bed. I'm not a big fan of Emin myself, but I felt this piece of work was a good example to illustrate this concept. All the viewer sees is an unmade bed with mess surrounding it - but the viewer's opinion or viewing of the piece may change once he or she knows of its background. The piece is presented as Emin's bed after several days of suicidal depression, and upon knowing this, I feel there's more of a significance to the piece rather than just an unmade bed. It's a part of Emin's history, just as a diary or sketchbook is part of mine - and although the piece may not mean anything to many who see it, it is of strong, raw personal significance regardless.
Links I found useful:
AI campaign: http://www.amnesty.org.uk/content.asp?CategoryID=11849#inspiration
James Mackay's project blog: http://enigmaimages.wordpress.com/
Enigma Images: http://www.enigmaimages.net/
Telegraph article: "Tracey Emin - dirty sheets and all": http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/culturereviews/3557865/Tracey-Emin-dirty-sheets-and-all.html
"My Bed" from the Saatchi Gallery: http://www.saatchi-gallery.co.uk/imgs/artists/emin-tracey/tracey-emin-my-bed.jpg
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