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Karen Horton’s inspiration

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Gateways: International Book Covers Exhibit and Catalog
| September 23, 2008


"Idioms is a series of exhibitions that explores the day-to-day world of graphic design by looking at visual languages and forms that designers use and the impact these have on the messages they express. Curated by Andrew Howard, the series is part of the programme that the Serralves Foundation has been developing with the Silo-Espaço Cultural, Norte Shopping in Matosinhos."  —Andrew Howard

Gateways: An International Exhibition of Book Covers is the 6th exhibition in the Idioms series curated by Andrew Howard (sponsored by ESAD). The exhibition is on display between July 31st and September 2008 at the Silo-Espaço Cultural, NorteShopping, in Porto, Portugal. 

The exhibition had a website set up for their call for submissions back in June. Since the initial call for entries, I was not able to find much information online about the show. But the curator and designer of the show, Andrew Howard, was so kind to send me some extra info with photos of the space and a beautifully type-set catalog for the show.











For me its a rarity to see a book cover exhibition in the midst of a shopping mall. But I think its fantastic.

The full exhibition included 400 cover designs, representing 53 designers from 14 countries. Most of the books were selected through an open call for submissions. Special invitations were extended to Jon Gray and David Pearson, who both are given substantial attention in the pages of the catalog (with essays/commentary in their own words). Jon Gray's chapter touches upon process, difficulties associated with being a freelancer, authors that have family members with artistic talents, pressures from sales, marketing and major book chains. David Pearson goes into great detail about the Penguin Great Ideas series designs, and spreads show covers from the Great Journeys and Great Loves series in full color. These two chapters alone make the exhibition catalog an incredible resource and source of inspiration (and at times support for those dealing with some of the challenges associated with a career in book cover design). Ariane Spanier, Helen Yentus, Paul Sahre, Coralie Bickford-Smith, Clare Skeats, Juan Pablo Cambariere, Gregg Kulick, and Jaime Keenan, were also given personal invitations to participate in the show.


The catalog took awhile to arrive (all the way from Portugal!), but it was a great surprise to find in the mail last week. I was expecting a typical catalog, a listing of entries...But what I got instead was a nicely designed book, which may take me a few hours to fully absorb. The writing by the curator, and also Jon Gray and David Pearson is top notch. Its not just a book of pretty pictures. The descriptions and commentaries are very informative and in some cases make me take extra notice to something I may have skimmed past (and most of the text is set in both English and Portuguese).




















Link:  more about Studio Andrew Howard

Tags:  book covers, graphic design, print, publishing

Topic: Exhibitions

Creative Dialogue

7 Comments |[ Add Comment ]

folco amoretti
on September 23, 2008

“where i can find this catalog?
”

 
Karen Horton
on September 23, 2008

“At the moment I think the exhibition catalog can only by purchased via the FNAC site. Hope this helps (and you can read the Portuguese better than me). I think the book is a great find, and I am hopeful that another distributor will make the book more readily available for purchase outside of Portugal.”

 
folco amoretti
on September 24, 2008

“thx karen,
Portuguese in similar than italian ....
i can try.”

 
Robert Schumann
on September 26, 2008

“Hope, I will get my own catalog these days. Andrew Howard did a great job in Porto.”

 
andrew howard
on October 01, 2008

“The Gateways book will be available to buy on-line shortly. We are in the process of finishing a website about the 'Idioms' exhibition series (of which Gateways is the 6th exhibition) through which other exhibition publications will also be available. The cost of the book will be 25 euros + shipping. I shall let Karen know when the site is ready and hopefully she will be able to post a notice here on designrelated. Andrew Howard (curator).”

 
Karen Horton
on December 17, 2008

“Andrew Howard, curator and designer for the Gateways exhibition and book, has finally launched a new website for The Idioms Series. The Gateways book is available for purchase via the site, along with other publications.


”

 
ruth mahoney
on May 05, 2009

“Is it all in Portuguese or it half english?”

 

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