On Monday my design group and I went to visit the V&A Museum to see a few exhibitions: the Memory Palace, V&A Illustration Awards and the Making It Up: Photographic Fictions.
I found all of them quite interesting but the one that was the most unusual was the Memory Palace. It was set out as a “walk-through book” which was something I haven’t heard of nor experienced before so I was quite excited to see it again as I went there previously with a friend over the summer.
The Memory Palace
I have to admit that I much enjoyed the second trip compared to the first as I was a bit overwhelmed by how strange it was, but now I was able to think deeper and analyse some of the pieces there.
The “walk-through book” was actually much easier to follow than it is in a normal book, as every part is sectioned off with plenty of illustrations and typography. The text wasn’t displayed in blocks of texts but broken up into two or three sentences. This created a sense of flow because it allows the viewer to take their time when going around the room and follow the story at their own pace, allowing them to take all of the information in rather than glazing over a large amount of information.
However it was quite difficult to follow exactly where to go next because of the fact that this “book” is spread across various walls, but somehow everything is still flowed perfectly as the mind will then take the pieces of information they have gathered and connect them. This means that it might be easier to read this “book” as an actual book, because it’s clear what to read next.
Francesco Franchi
As the “walk-through book” covered a whole room, it meant that everything was larger so that all of the little details could be seen up close. An example of this is the first illustration done by Francesco Franchi, which was an infographic poster on the art of mnemonics (an aid in remembering).
The poster itself is extremely large, much larger than A1 and is set out in a portrait orientation with the timeline at the side. This means that the viewer is able to see the type clearly, even the smallest one. It is quite hard to follow the type due to the poster’s incredible detail, which is probably why the designers had used a monotone palette as a colourful one would only confuse the viewer and all of that detail would be lost.
Both of the typefaces they used were sans serif, meaning that it was easier to read as there weren’t any little serifs to get in the way when they’re at a small scale. The one used for the heading has a digital/sci-fi appearance – much like the ones used in digital clocks – which could relate to the technology that had been lost in this future world. The other typeface is quite plain and this might suggest that people have forgotten what printed words looked like and so used its simplest form.
This means that at first the poster is quite overwhelming because there is a lot of type, little illustrations and symbols to read. However the way it’s been displayed allows the viewer to take each part by circle before moving onto the next one. The eyes flow accordingly to how everything is placed: from the silhouette of a head at the bottom, then across all of the circles that are connected by thin lines.
These lines could bring up connotations of sunrays or the solar system, as a series of circles are connected to such lines. This thus is connected to science which and supports the whole subject of this infographic as it’s showing the art of mnemonics.
The combination of these “sun rays” and circles bring up the overall image of cogs, so might suggest that the human mind is similar to that of a clock, as when time goes by our minds expand to take in more knowledge.
