How to generate a positive dialogue with a community that suffered a natural disaster?

Visual References At the Beginning Typologies The haiti poster Websites Apps for smartphones Maps The new towns From the survey

Visual Experiments Picturing the idea Word and environment The collage series Visual manipulations before/after Flyers:ripped Sewing a dialogue Shaked copies Live!

Index

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Visual references

In this section are collected the visual references that I used to orient myself during this journey. Some of this references are directly connected with the context of the Major Project definition. Some others have been a useful branch of my mental process, just like some sections of the mind-map have been for the context.

At the beginningTypologies

Maps

At the beginning

I started analysing two aspects of the graphic design applied to the place management. What follows is a simple collection of visual references that I found when I was starting deeply analysing my research question.

The first two pages are from Milton Glaser’s works regarding different place management artworks. The last pages of this section are instead a collection of poster and other artworks issued during the 1992’s Jugoslavia war.

Images taken from:Glaser, M. & Ilic, M.

The Design of dissent (2005)

Design and Rethoric

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At the beginning

At the beginning War is not a natural disaster. However I found interesting those artworks because they instantly give a strong feeling regarding the problem and the critical situation.

Design and Rethoric

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At the beginning

Typologies

I researched the communication that young designers produced for the 2010’s Haiti earthquake. I also divided the images in different typologies, in order to analyse better the common keypoints.

In these pages I researched more than twenty websites that discuss about L’Aquila and its community.

This analysis is focused on some Apps that I thought were interesting because of their subjects.

The Haiti’s posters

Websites

Apps for smartphones

TypologiesThe Haiti’s postersIn this research I categorised some of the posters that participated at the “Haiti poster project”. Limited edition posters have been donated by designers and artists from around the world. All money raised has been donated to Doctors Without Borders.

The categorisation:

• Hands• Hearts• Maps• TextandTypography• Band-aids• Geometrical

Design and Rethoric

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Typologies

Within every typology it is possible to recognise other subcategories, such as: stitches or threads, crumbled paper or ground, crosses, sysmic wawes.

The Haiti poster

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Typologies

During the research I observed that just few posters out of the majority have been made in landscape instead of portrait ratio.

The Haiti poster

Design and Rethoric

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Typologies

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TypologiesWebsitesIn this categorization I tried to understand the level of information (news, governance, citizens) and innovation into the city.

The most interesting examples of innovation were given by Wired Magazine and Facenews.

• Wired created on its website a column called “#occypylaquila”. This section hosts a monthly selection of up-to-date projects made to rebuild the city and the social tissue through technology.

• Facenews is the first free-press of the city. This monthly zine was created by three local students and is now at its sixth issue.

On the other page:

• Institutionalwebsites• Privateblogs• Associations• News

18 | 19

Typologies

Design and Rethoric

TypologiesCities’ appsThe aim of this research was to analyse the needs of the consumers and the commercial answer given by the smartphone’s apps; also, I wanted to investigate the visual communication of different applications in several zones of the world (some of those hit by a natural disaster). Some of these are merely touristic commodities, but some reveal interesting interactions (i.e the possibility to upload picture into the app’s community or the augmented reality for the fourth New Orleans’ app.)

Below this page there is an App for the city of Christchurch. With this software it is possible to use the augmented reality in order to see the buildings’ appearance before the earthquake. It also is possible discover the new points of interest of the city and several other options.

On the other page:

• NewOrleans• L’Aquila• SocialNetworks• Earthquake

20 | 21

Typologies

Maps

The first map shows the deployment of the CASE project on the surroundings of the medieval city centre of L’Aquila.Some of the New Towns are actually inside the borders of the Gran Sasso National Park, a wild and poor connected area.

In the second map is represented how L’Aquila’s city centre looked like in march 2012. I decided to visual represent the assembly points or streets, as well as the bar, clubs or pubs that used to be in the city centre before the earthquake. This map is just an example of the difficulties for the young to gather and to create a long-lasting relationship.

New town

From the survey

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L’Aquilacity centre

club/bar/pub re-opened

club/bar/pub moved out

red zone - closed

assembly squares

assembly streets

club/bar/pub closed

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Chapter

L’Aquilacity centre

club/bar/pub re-opened

club/bar/pub moved out

red zone - closed

assembly squares

assembly streets

club/bar/pub closed

24 | 25

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1 Km

1 mi

Case Project

Hill / Forest / Mountain

L’Aquila

Legend

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Chapter

1 Km

1 mi

Case Project

Hill / Forest / Mountain

L’Aquila

Legend

26 | 27

Design and Rethoric

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Chapter

Visual experiments

This section is probably the core of this book.I tried to visually express my topic through visual experiments about the research question. Some are collage I took sticking different pages on pictures, some others are digital manipulation, or exercises with different materials.

Picturing the ideaWord and environment

The collage seriesVisual manipulations

before/afterFlyers:ripped

Sewing a dialogueShaked copies

Live!

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Chapter

Picturing the idea

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The first sketches regarding the research question. I was fascinated by the division within the same city. Young people in an old crumbled environment.

sketches: picturing the idea

32 | 33

Picturing the idea

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First experiments regarding the interaction between the word earthquake and community.In the page on the right I started creating mixing experiments between actual pictures of L’Aquila and new contaminations.

sketches: picturing the idea

34 | 35

Picturing the idea

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Word and environment

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How to express the concept of community with the only word? I first tried to work with a neutral peaceful image, the cloudy sky. I moved eventually to a collage taken from different images of L’Aquila. Two pictures of two streets, one plastic filter and the typeface.

word and environment

38 | 39

Word and environment

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The collage series

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At the core of these visual experimentation there is the idea of let the scaffolds and the red zone disappear. What would it happen if the scaffolds become a new beginning, a new door for the creativity. What if they could carry out a positive message?

the collage series

42 | 43

The collage series

The first step of this work has been covering the ruins, the scaffolds, the barriers.I just stuck a white paper on all the barriers and the holes I wanted to erase, to see what was the suggestions that I receive from this simple operation.

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With the first collage I tried to express the concept of city centre now lived by young. The scaffolds become a canvas and the main street is lived again.

On the previous pages: the scaffolds disappear. What once was one border of the red zone, now becomes the repository of new creativity.

the collage series

46 | 47

The collage series

This road is inside the red zone. It is forbidden to stay there. It is because of this reason that I imagined that street as a new assembly point, where the people are welcomed to stay and gather.

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This was the most famous bar of the city centre; after the earthquake has been closed. The idea of this experiment is to bring a new life to the place with the creativity.

the collage series

48 | 49

The collage series

Graffiti on the scaffolds of one of the main streets of the city centre.

Design and Rethoric

On the other page, the barrier seemed to me a sport horse, so I decided to add a “real” one on top of it.

Again the concept of community comes into my mind. I tried to add some colour were people used to gather before the earthquake.

the collage series

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Chapter

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Visual manipulations

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Chapter

Originally this photo was shoot during the 2009 G8, and pictured the former prime minister Berlusconi with Barack Obama. I thought the disney characters were more appropriate to raise the spirit of the inhabitants.

visual manipulation

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I tried to picture the contrast between the old and the new by adding a skyscraper’s glass where there were big cracks on the dome.

visual manipulation

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Visual manipulations

The occupy London’s movement went to L’Aquila’s main square.

Design and Rethoric

Another metaphor for the concept of community in a shocked place. Youngsters takeover the place and start playing again.

visual manipulation

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Visual manipulations

I overlapped several pictures of the city and I tried to see the results. A destroyed square becomes full of people. A woman in a tend has a house again.

Design and Rethoric

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Chapter

before/after

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before/ how to communicate in a very simple way the idea of something that goes destroyed?

62 | 63

before/after

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/after how to communicate in a very simple way the idea of something that goes destroyed?

1 | 2

Chapter

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in between how to communicate in a very simple way the idea of something that goes destroyed?And how to communicate the reconstruction?

1 | 2

Chapter

66 | 67

before/after

before/after how to communicate in a very simple way the idea of something that goes destroyed?And how to communicate the reconstruction?

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Chapter

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Flyers: ripped

Design and Rethoric

Flyers: ripped In this investigation I tried to see the visual message that came from a series of flyers ripped out and then roughly reassembled.

1 | 2

Chapter

72 | 73

flyers: ripped

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Sewing a dialogue

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Sewing a dialogue in these works I tore a couple of flyers from a club and I then sewed them again.

1 | 2

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Sewing a dialogue The idea that comes from this experiment is that after an event, whatever is the patch, the trace will remain.

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78 | 79

sewing a dialogue

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Shaked Copies

I chose two pictures from a photography book. Then I went to the copying machine and I experimented the results of modifying the images through the shacking or the moving of the books during the copy.

The two originals are on the left.

Images taken from :World photography, Cambpell, B. (1981)Littlehampton Book

Services

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Live!

Turn the pages and be part of the experiment.

This series of images are specifically selected in order to determine the different feelings the experiment could determine on the viewer depending on the different context.

Don’t be afraid of the consequences!

Images taken from:Epstein, M. (2009)

Recreation: american photographs 73-88

Steidl

Meyerowitz, J. (2006) Aftermath - Phaidon

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72 | 73

Live!

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How to generate a positive dialogue with a community that suffered a natural disaster?

Emanuele CatenaDesign and Rethoric