Two People – Two Objects

Eiko Ojala

Eiko Ojala is a graphic designer who is also professional in paper cutting and illustration. His illustrations and posters have been widely used in many magazines and books. His works make fully use of the light and  shadow, the contrast between different colors, and the combination of different elements . These factors make his works have a sense of depth and touch the viewers difference emotions and senses.

He started to paint when he can remember things, now he’s focused on books and magazines create paper sculptures, collage, illustration, such as different types of artistic creation. Arising from the reuse of natural high and low light, he created a stunning and elegant portraits and body! His works are used in a variety of books, magazines,  and novels, which made his works spread widely in the range of worldwide.  His modern thinking and creative idea also inspires lots of artists all around the world. Eiko tend to express his idea in a unique way. His works not only deliver the information, but also shows his own style. So in most cases, his works have both commercial value and artistic value.

The use of strong complementary color help to make this whole picture more vivid by the visual effect of the contrast. And it highlight the red parts and make the red awl looks even sharper.

The use of layers also make Eiko’s work different from other artists’ work. The layers creates a sense of depth in his work. And the use of light and shadow make his work motional, which was a very obvious progress in the field of graphic design.

Details in his work makes his works more delicate, moreover, the details help to carry out the theme and the idea of the artist in a more effective way because the details build up a story board itself by using the conflict between different characters.

Shigeo Fukuda

Shigeo Fukuda was a sculptor, graphic artist and poster designer who created optical illusions. His art pieces usually portray deception, such as Lunch With a Helmet On, a sculpture created entirely from forks, knives, and spoons that casts a detailed shadow of a motorcycle…

His works are very simple and clear, but he make fully use of his sense of humor to better communicate with the viewers.

Fukuda was inducted into the Art Directors Club Hall of Fame in New York City, which described him as “Japan’s consummate visual communicator”, making him the first Japanese designer chosen for this recognition.

Fukuda’s posters were described as “distilled complex concepts into compelling images of logo-simplicity”. A pair of posters created to celebrate Earth Day include a design showing the Earth as a seed opening against a solid sea-blue background and “1982 Happy Earth Day”, which shows an axe with its head against the ground and a small branch sprouting upwards from its handle

His home outside Tokyo featured a 4-foot-high (1.2 m) front door that would appear far away from someone approaching the house. This door was a visual trick, with the actual entrance to the house being an unornamented white door designed to blend in seamlessly with the walls of the house. His works are accepted and appreciated by people all around the world

Designed in 1975, this poster “victory 1945”, similar to comic form, creates an elegant and humorous graphics language, reverse painted a bullet flew back to the barrel’s image. This poster satires the war and it has profound meaning. It informs that the people who starts the war, who shoot the gun will finally hurt themselves in someways. This commemorate the 30 anniversary of the end of World War II poster design, won the international design award. Its design works, humor, funny, can give the viewer a visual pleasure.

The light and shadow in his work are reasonable and realistic but the item he describe was abstract and unrealistic, this also create a contrast between reality and illusion. The procedure of making this poster do not seem too complicated. The artist only use some geometric patterns and several curved lines to create that whole picture. But the picture looks clean and comfortable at the first glance. The poster basically consist of three colors, yellow, black and white. These three colors create a strong contrast between each other. The font is also simple but it can express the theme of the poster. The font creates a sense of formal and serious, and it fits the simple style of the whole picture.

Transform from 2D to 3D

I really like the way Eiko and Shigeo make use of negative spaces, so I am going to utilize negative spaces in my work.

Eiko’s paper cutting elements create a sense of depth and make his work very vivid and realistic. It might be a good idea for me to use the form of paper cutting in my work to transform it from 2D to 3D.

I enjoyed how Shigeo use very simple symbols and graphics to convey complex ideas in a understandable way. So I would integrate it into my work.

Using paper cutting to create layers like the German street artist 1010 can help me to accomplish the goal of making it more stereoscopic.

I also plan to make some interactions between the viewer and my installation.

Tools I Plan to Use

thread

scissors

knife

glue gun

acrylic

pencil

eraser