I recently attended the Opening Night Party for the Museum of Fine Arts (MFA) Museum Council. Every guest was randomly assigned to a half hour tour with a curator. I have to be 100% honest and say that I groaned a bit when I found out that I was on the "Summer of Love" tour. It wasn't an exhibit that seemed particularly interesting to me.
But...as always, when you get to meet a curator -- a person who is geeked out about the exhibit -- everything becomes interesting!
It's a small exhibit -- mostly posters and album covers...
...along with some photographs from the time period.
I, of course, was drawn to some of the artwork by a favorite motif:
I appreciated that the exhibit gave some information on historical art that led to this style of work.
(Check out more of Josef Albers work here.) A poster in similar colors:
My biggest take away from the exhibit was the typography of Wes Wilson.
Wilson became famous for his psychedelic lettering, which was based on lettering by turn-of-the-century artist, Alfred Roller. You can download fonts based on both Roller and Wilson's (also here) typography work.
I love the way he fills the space with type. This...
...is probably his most famous typography poster. No photographic or drawn image, but using the type to create the image of fire. It's an idea that I want to play with in my own work!
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