M35 creates a topographical identity for a project about Australia's rural landscape

Date
27 April 2017

Sydney-based multidisciplinary agency M35 has created an identity for a research and exhibition project by Future Method Studio, called A Field Guide to Getting Lost. Future Method Studio has explored the sigificance of the travelling stock routes in Australia, which are strips of public land used for driving cattle and as grazing space for livestock, and have become a part of Australia’s history. The work forms part of an exhibition this year titled, The Long Paddock, commissioned by the New Landscapes Institute.

On recieving the brief M35’s first thoughts were “centered around how people nagivated these travelling stock routes and how that might be used to form part of the identity”. “Our initial thinking was around referencing map coordinates and how these could be used to share some of the stock routes,” explains the studio. “However during the process we discovered that the routes were not navigated by western mapping methods so it meant rethinking our approach.”

The concept behind the identity landed on “the moment when someone realises they are lost” and how people rotate the map to try and make sense of their surroundings. “We wanted to flip this idea on its head so that instead of being a moment of confusion, rotation result in clarity,” says M35. “Therefore the way this ideintity makes visual sense is by rotating the piece of collateral it is printed on.”

The typeface is Favorit by Dinamo Typefaces and was chosen specifically for the G, which “when rotated visually reference directional arrows”. The colour palette of the identity emulates the Australian rural landscape with khaki greens and rusty browns offset by lighter sand and oatmeal colours. A fairly type-heavy identity, the only visual mark is the fine lines clustered together thoroughout, which are “an abstraction of a map of the actual stock routes” and are an elegant and subtle addition.

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M35: A Field Guide to Getting Lost

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M35: A Field Guide to Getting Lost

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M35: A Field Guide to Getting Lost

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M35: A Field Guide to Getting Lost

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About the Author

Rebecca Fulleylove

Rebecca Fulleylove is a freelance writer and editor specialising in art, design and culture. She is also senior writer at Creative Review, having previously worked at Elephant, Google Arts & Culture, and It’s Nice That.

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