Final writing

Title of this project: No need to fit: Embracing the Imperfect Beauty

1 Abstract

Through experiments with the imperfect beauty of letters, can we embrace the value of beauty outside norms?

Going to a good school, working for a famous company, embracing the right look, …Sometimes people judge people using different criteria. It seems that the more you meet each of these criteria to a large extent, the more perfect and attractive you are to certain people. I used to think it was important to pursue such invisible perfection. However, they soon put pressure on me and made me feel suffocated.

As a starting point I chose to look at a historical ceramic piece, “Furisode” Tea Bowl (1600) and I reconsidered the definition of imperfect beauty in typefaces through my studio practice. My definition of imperfection in this project means a state of being outside of the perfect mould. I was particularly drawn to the misshapen forms and three-dimensional textures accidentally created by materials. Using these imperfect letters as a tool, I explore conceptual alphabets that express beauty that does not obey the rules of traditional perfection.

The audience is asked to find the pieces of the alphabet that fit into the perfectly engraved mould on the plate as if playing a puzzle game. The misshapen letters are crushed or broken when the audience tries to force them to fit the plate. It is as if each letter represents an individual person. Ultimately, the audience realises that none of the misshapen letters could perfectly fit that form/expectation. Through this experience, I hope that the audience will become aware of my idea of finding beauty in diversity and imperfection and realise the message that it is not necessary to fit the perfection that is demanded.

2 Context

Take a look at any text that appears in everyday life. You may notice a certain typeface being used quite a lot: Helvetica, a typeface used in everything from Lufthansa Airlines to Microsoft’s corporate logo. Helvetica is known as a universal typeface that does not interfere with content like clear glass. I felt a certain sense of discomfort. This may stem from the pressure I have experienced to be ‘perfect’. This uncomfortable feeling was the start of my project.

I grew up, similarly to many others in my generation, with values that demanded perfection. I used to believe that going to a good school, working for a famous company, and getting married at a certain age were all perfect and wonderful things I should embrace. However, I began to feel suffocated by the effort to achieve this perfection. After running away from such expectations, I encountered new values for beauty. Ironically, the ‘beauty of imperfection’ had been developed by the same country that implemented my initial chase for perfection. To return to my initial point, my feeling about Helvetica may have been that the excellence of the typeface made it seem like a perfect person to me, and I felt pressured to be so on my own.

The Swiss typographer Emil Ruder refers to imperfect beauty as described in Okakura’s The Book of Tea (1906). Ruder focuses on the idea of ‘the worship of the Imperfect, purposely leaving something unfinished for the play of the imagination’ (Ruder, 2018, p. 88) and discusses typography that is not perfect. The idea of finding beauty in the imperfect in Japan seemed new to him. Its philosophy, more than a century old, attracted me too. I was surprised to discover that Japanese society, which I had found to be constricting, used to have a tolerant attitude towards imperfection. I believed that it was Japanese society that created this pressure for perfection, but I now see how this pressure also exists all over the world and is created by a value system known as perfectionism.

According to research by Hewitt and Flett (1991, p. 457), perfectionism is divided into three categories: self-oriented perfectionism, other-oriented perfectionism, and socially prescribed perfectionism. Among these, I focused particularly on socially prescribed perfectionism. Socially prescribed perfectionism refers to ‘people’s beliefs and perceptions that significant others hold unrealistic standards for them, judge them harshly and pressure them to be perfect’. As I read this research paper, I realised this was what I had been feeling. I was somehow imposing an externally imprinted image of perfection on myself, rather than my ideals, and felt suffocated.

I developed this project by drawing on the approach of Junichiro Tanizaki’s in Praise of Shadow (1999). By focusing on the unique aesthetic value of the traditional Japanese beauty of shading, Tanizaki offers a new perspective on beauty and succeeds in making readers think about what shading beauty is. Similarly, in this project, I wanted to provide an opportunity to think about imperfection and perfection through typography, taking the traditional Japanese concept of the beauty of imperfection as a starting point. Just as Tanizaki’s scenic and psychographic approach to essay writing captured the attention of not only academic readers, I am trying to reflect his writing style in this writing.

I attempted to translate the concept of ‘imperfect beauty’ into typefaces by experimenting with the processes and materials that enable the creation of these forms. In my studio practice, I created asymmetric typefaces, letters with some strokes missing, or distorted or squashed digital typefaces. Besides digital experimentation, I stretched, crushed, punched, baked and cut letters using readily available materials such as clay, sugar and wax. In the process of my experimentation, I found the method of Conceptual Alphabets. Conceptual alphabets are defined as ‘the alphabets that illustrate or embody ideas, sets of constraints, and editorial perspectives, illustrating their concepts through letterforms rather than strictly pictorial means’ (Willen and Strals, 2003, p. 23). I decided to take this approach, attracted by the accidental textures of letters that the material creates.

Like the work of Andreas Scheiger, who is featured as the designer of Conceptual Alphabet, I wanted to use letters and tangible materials to convey a message. Scheiger’s work, Evolution of Type, Exhibit 16/1-9 (2011) was born out of the idea that ‘metal types and letterpress prints are fading away from modern day life, and this is perhaps how they would turn up one day’ (Typoholic, 2012, p.97). This is a visual work in which the metal letters seem to be trapped in a beautiful caramel-like amber, giving the audience the illusion that the metal type is being displayed in a museum as a thing of the past. This is an interesting link between the designer’s idea and the material.

I became increasingly fascinated by the unique cracks, the three-dimensionality and the imperfect beauty of the accidental product that each material produced. Yet with each iteration of the process, I realised new insights. For example, when Helvetica was considered a complete and finished typeface, it had only one perfect form, whereas an imperfect Helvetica could be created in an infinite number of ways. This discovery made me despair, but at the same time, I realised that I had to find my definition of imperfect beauty. My definition of imperfect beauty was then revealed by an accidental alphabet that emerged during the production process. The alphabet was an awkward, bumpy, three-dimensional letter, formed when I inadvertently dropped a piece of melted sugar. When I saw those letters, I found them beautiful. Its shape, which deviated from the perfect mould, was the typeface of imperfect beauty I was looking for. The definition of imperfection in this project means a state of being outside of a perfect form or mould.

However, I was not just pursuing a new typeface form. I wanted to communicate a social message through letters. This attitude is close to Jenny Holzer’s attitude (2018). She transmits critical messages on social issues such as power and gender through the media of text and objects. Through her art, she speaks for those who have been treated unfairly. Like her, I want to question what perfection is through imperfect text works and create opportunities to make visible and give discussion to the pressures that perfection brings.

The unique, out of mould, conceptual alphabet not only conveys a message in its letter form but also layers the meaning that each letter is at the same time a person who does not fit into the confines of society (the mould). To celebrate imperfect beauty is to express the values that embrace them. In contrast, the perfectly carved letters represent the pressure of perfection. Those plates, cold and glowing in silver, represent invisible pressures. We look for a letter that fits the perfect shape, but there is no clean shape that fits. There are only letters in unique, imperfect forms that are never the same. And then we realise that. We don’t all have to fit into one perfect form.

3 Projected contribution

Through the material-based experimental Conceptual alphabet, the project celebrates the imperfect beauty of typefaces and at the same time the importance of the unique, unconventional individuality of each person.

The placement of Beatrice Warde’s The Crystal Goblet (1956) as the antithesis revealed my attitude as a graphic communication designer. Warde insisted that typography should be like transparent glass, which does not disturb the content. However, I chose to explore a typographic style that communicates in its aesthetics rather than being used as an invisible language tool to convey content. The experimentation was not limited to digital. I was fascinated by the accidental forms that tangible materials can produce and the possibilities that textures have to carry messages and feelings.

The work doesn’t just explore new typographic forms, but it aims to challenge and offer an approach to social issues through typography, based on my background in sociology. Rather than simply using imperfect letters as a tool to communicate a message, I utilised the characteristics of tangible letters to offer the audience the opportunity to experience them not only visually but also through the tactile senses. Through this experience, the project aims to encourage the audience to think about the imperfect through typography.

The importance of this experiment in the field of graphic communication design is that it expresses the social subject through the tangibility and materiality of the conceptual alphabet. This makes the subject visible and invites the audience to recognise the issue. I believe that there is still room for exploration in the translation of this medium, in which the existence of letters, which cannot normally be touched, is understood through material.

As a graphic communication designer, I am looking forward to continuing experimenting with typography, materiality and social perspective and exploring how various social subjects can be visualised through typography.

Annotated references

“Furisode” Tea Bowl (1600-1700). Available at: https://www.tnm.jp/modules/r_collection/index.php?controller=dtl&colid=G5749&lang=en.

Hewitt, P. L. and Flett, G. L. (1991) ‘Perfectionism in the self and social contexts: conceptualization, assessment, and association with psychopathology’, Journal of personality and social psychology, 60(3), pp. 456–470. doi: 10.1037//0022-3514.60.3.456.

Holzer, J. (2018a) IT IS GUNS series.

Holzer, J. (2018b) Untitled. Tate Modern, London.

Okakura K. (1961) The Book of Tea. Iwanami Shoten, Publishers.

Scheiger, A. (2011) Evolution of Type, Exhibit 16/1-9.

Schmid, H. (2018) Ruder typography Ruder philosophy. Warsaw, Poland: Langenscheidt.

Tanazaki, J. (1999) In praise of shadows. London: Jonathan Cape.

Viction Workshop (ed.) (2012) Typoholic: Material Types in Design. Hong Kong, Hong Kong: Viction Workshop.

Warde, B. (1956) The Crystal Goblet; Sixteen Essays on Typography. Cleveland :World Pub. Co.

Willen, B. and Strals, N. (2003) Lettering & Type: Creating letters & designing typefaces. New York, NY, USA: Princeton Architectural Press.

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