Compose two styles
Rather than blending two styles into a middle, this assigns them roles: one carries the structure, the other appears as an accent. Where the two fight, it says so before you start.
How to divide the work
- Composition
- Follow Arabic Calligraphy: Work right to left, shape the mass through overlap and empty ground
- Type
- Set in Arabic Calligraphy's manner (Choose one script and follow its proportions for joining and stacking), and let Iranian Poster's lettering (Turn one calligraphic stroke into the image and keep text small at the edge) appear only where you want the eye to catch.
- Material
- Ground in Arabic Calligraphy's material (Thick and thin from the reed angle, gold and blue kept to ornament); bring in exactly one thing from Iranian Poster (Two or three flat colors, counting the paper white as one).
- Colour
- Build on #e9e6dd, #67635d, #171615 and admit one accent from #e9e6dd, #67635d, #171615.
Where they fight
- Roughly 1953 years apart. Keep one of them recognisably period rather than letting both drift into the middle.
Caution
- Arabic Calligraphy Setting Arabic letter by letter as if it were Latin breaks the joins, and the word stops being readable long before it stops being beautiful.
- Iranian Poster Piling metaphor on until every clue to the subject is gone leaves a sheet that never tells anyone what the event is.
Image prompt
An original image that takes its structure from Arabic Calligraphy (Style, 7th century–) and its accent from Iranian Poster (Style, 1960s–). Structural cues: Architectural letterforms; Canonical scripts; Breathing thick-and-thin; Composition united with ornament. Accent cues, used sparingly: Calligraphic line as form; Poetic metaphor; The compositional force of Persian script; A restrained palette. Composition: Work right to left, shape the mass through overlap and empty ground. Type and lettering: Choose one script and follow its proportions for joining and stacking. Let one material quality come from the second style: Two or three flat colors, counting the paper white as one. Mood: Luxury, Calm, Trust, Rebellion. Color: build on #e9e6dd, #67635d, #171615 with a single accent drawn from #e9e6dd, #67635d, #171615. Constraints: do not imitate, reference or name any specific artist, studio, brand, character or copyrighted work. Produce an original composition in the general period languages described above.
Related entries
- Arabic Calligraphy 7th century– / Style / Calligraphic Traditions
A tradition that holds writing to be the highest of the arts. From Kufic to Thuluth it has gone on refining an architecture of line, in the tension between canon and individual hand.
- Iranian Poster 1960s– / Style / Regional Graphics
The Iranian graphic culture Morteza Momayez opened: the line of Persian calligraphy fused with modernist composition, growing a poster tradition that speaks in poetic metaphor across revolution and war.
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