You can see the results in use (and all of the fabulous clothes) in the Paul Textile Gallery and Fashion Arts Gallery until February 6, 2012.

What were your inspirations for the Material World typeface?

The grid-like mesh of natural elements like spider webs was an inspiration, as well as man-made things like chain-link fences. Both can feel either very clean and manufactured or organic depending on how they are viewed or manipulated.

How did you design this typeface? Did you make the whole alphabet?

Functioning typefaces are created with specialized software that allows them to be typed directly from the keyboard, and includes important  information about spacing, alternate weights, etc. Because we were only using these new letters to spell short phrases, and because of the time required to actually create a functioning font, I simply made the letters in Adobe Illustrator with the pen tool. Creating each letter isn’t difficult, but it can be time consuming, so I drew only the characters I needed for this exhibition.

Why did you design a typeface and not use one that already existed?

While thinking about what typography and imagery could be used to represent the intricate materials used in the exhibition, I did look at a number of pre-existing options. Ornate display type tends to be created to connote specific imagery—Victorianism, holidays, or the stereotypes of a foreign culture, for instance. I wanted something that felt contemporary and spoke to the physical construction of the garments, but also seemed organic as well. It didn’t take very long to realize that drawing my own letters was the most natural approach.

How does the design of Material World enhance a visit to the show?

The primary goal of any design is to enhance the content. The experience of shopping at a big-box grocery store is very different from visiting an expensive clothing retailer, and it’s not because of the objects for sale. By using dark colors and not using more light than necessary, we are trying to create a space that feels intimate and seductive when compared to other galleries. The typography, too—both in its design and its use in the show—is meant to accentuate the seductive nature of the work, as well as reference the intricate patterns and handwork evidenced in many of the pieces.

The fury of the Biennale has begun, and Gloria at the palladian U.S. Pavilion is looking polished and practiced for the crowds. In the past week, many of the final touches and adjustments have been made in the gallery, a fact made many times more complicated with 13 live performers, a dual channel video room and operating sunbed, ATM, pipe organ, treadmill and tank. Most of this was accomplished under the watchful eye of the IMA’s on-site installation team, Brad Dilger and Mike Bir, who oversaw the installation of all of the work and fine tuned just about everything you see in the pavilion, and Yvel Guelcé, the Director of IT who installed the attendance counter and the localized wireless for the TAP Gloria mobile tour.

Amanda York, Brad Dilger, Yvel Guelce and Gabriele HaBarad diligently working during practice and installation week.

After all this prep, here are some of the interesting and funny stories that developed while we put the final touches on Gloria!

After the installation of the organ, the music composer Jonathan Bailey arrived to test the ATM and organ sound precision and listen to the music in the gallery space. He had to cancel the transactions or else remove hundreds of dollars from the machine during this testing phase.

Jonathan Bailey compares notes with his notes.

While he was testing the machine, I asked him about the possibility of our banks getting worried about multiple cancelled transactions and locking our cards. Jonathan switched to an older card in his wallet just in case something like this happened, and not a moment to0 soon. Shortly after, someone walked up to say hello to him and he got distracted when the machine ejected his card. After a brief wait, the machine ate the card, never to be seen again! This is a feature of the machine’s security, in case you leave your card behind, but is a bit inconvenient if you need to make about 100 transactions in 2 hours!

Another interesting development came after the female gymnasts arrived in Venice to begin rehearsals on the Delta seat.

The gymnasts and choreographer Rebecca Davis warm up in the white room for rehearsals.

They lithely hopped on to the armrest, only to find themselves swimming in mid air, looking for visual purchase. In Circus Warehouse, their practice space, they unknowingly had hundreds of objects upon which to anchor their gaze and find balance. In the white gallery space, they couldn’t hold their poses. They spoke with Jennifer and Guillermo and agreed something had to be done. The IMA’s Brad Dilger painted custom dots, then had each gymnast test for placement. The final position of the grey dots can be seen during the performance of Body in Flight (Delta) in the pavilion today.

On the left, the pair of dots on the wall, placed for the gymnasts varying heights.

Another bit of valuable behind-the-scenes info: U.S. Pavilion Commissioner and IMA Chair of Contemporary Art Lisa Freiman gives a sharp looking haircut.

Photographer Nick D'Emilio needed a trim.

We have spent some time on-site, working in the U.S. Pavilion and the Giardini as it prepares for an influx of visitors, filming the Commissioner, the IMA’s Lisa Freiman, as she gave an orientation to a group of interns who will tend to the Pavilion during the 6 month run of the show, and shooting the last of the artwork being installed and rehearsed (we can’t show you yet!) with Jennifer and Guillermo (that is, Allora & Calzadilla) looking on. We are working in tandem with photographers Tascha Horowitz, of the IMA, and Andrew Bordwin and Nick D’Emilio, of Andrew Bordwin Studio Inc., to document everything as it happens. We will be releasing more images and video online in the next few weeks, and you can look for the Gloria catalogue to come out later this summer.

Lisa Freiman discussing the exhibition with the summer interns.

Allora & Calzadilla watching the rehearsals.

We have also been gathering b-roll around Venice. We see the bright red Biennale advertising in every campo (they also provide the only benches in the square- smart!) We stopped in Piazza San Marco, took a quick tour of the Teatro la Fenice and hopped over the Ponte Accademia to visit Santa Maria della Salute. While the city is famously difficult to navigate, we have been able to find a lot of the famous attractions to shoot without much trouble and have been enjoying our share of Italian food and gelato.

We will continue to film as the Biennale opens this week, including VIP tours and vernissage celebrations, and you can look for almost everything we shoot to go up on the Biennale microsite. Also don’t forget to follow us on twitter @USPavilion11 for all the latest news from the Pavilion. As the Italians say- ciao!

I have the extreme pleasure of working on the IMA’s video team, a job which, while incorporating a large amount of logistics and planning, also includes the unique task of interviewing artists, designers, scholars and curators about projects they are working on with the IMA. I have to say, this is my favorite part of the job. I am definitely a “people person,” and I enjoy hearing firsthand from the artists as they explain their work, their inspirations and thoughts they had while making it, and the funny behind-the-scenes stories.  All of these elements help it come together as a meaningful experience with a work of art for me. This is also part of why the IMA has made a commitment to producing these videos. Not every visitor can sit down for 30 minutes with the artist (Marina Abramović excluded) so we have to find a meaningful, illustrative way to share their thoughts and motivations with our visitors (and the world).

In watching or conducting many interviews produced by the IMA over the past few years, I have learned a lot about how to speak to many different types of people to get the type of material we are looking for: explanatory for the general public, but not over-simplified for specialists and aficionados, shows the personality of the interviewee, and explains what the IMA is trying to do through the work or program we are discussing.

First, do your research. I have found that even the most planned interviews (think typed list of organized questions, lots of time, quiet interview location) have a peculiar way of going awry. It’s good to have a framework to base your questions on, but understand that the natural course of conversation, and small bits of information the artist brings up, may lead to better or deeper conversation on the topic. This is why a broad understanding of the artist’s work is helpful. Also, what is the scholarly basis for the exhibition or work for which you are gathering material? This may sound elementary, but you don’t want to base your line of questions around an artist’s use of materials when the curator is expounding on spiritual influences in the show.

Know your audience- and your interviewee. Who are you interviewing? Who will watch the resulting video? A famed scholar or author will require a different form of questioning than an emerging artist. Likewise, the resulting videos will have different audiences. Determining who it is that you are working with, and for whom, will lead to a stronger outcome.

Be respectful, but ask the hard questions. This makes me feel like I’m trying to be Oprah. However, I think it can be easy to ask surface questions or let the interviewee gloss over something which is vital to the understanding of their point of view. By understanding who the audience is, I can re-frame questions when I feel that the artist is simplifying or missing a key point. Following the thread of what the artist is saying is how to get the richest, most meaningful content.

Make it a conversation. Very little to none of my face or voice ends up in the final product, however, having a lively or engaged discussion with an artist results in better, more useful or dynamic footage. The person being interviewed may be uncomfortable, so creating a relaxed environment where they can feel comfortable to think about what they would like to say or pause for a breath is key. A sense of humor goes a long way.

Make steady eye contact, smile, but don’t be creepy, and don’t make any noise. This is harder than it sounds. I have found that I am an automatic “mhmmmm”-er. I had to work very hard to stop these conversational soothers. I have replaced this with ardent, almost nonstop, nodding (I only occasionally notice I am doing it!) Again, I try to not look too crazy. I think this is my unspoken cue to my interviewee that I am keenly listening to what they are saying.

Speaking of- Listen! This can be especially hard in an uncomfortable situation; my mind tends to race ahead to the next question when I am nervous. However, this is the most important part of being the interviewer.

So, why was I so afraid of Guillermo’s question? Truth be told, I had no reason to be. I was sufficiently prepared with multiple examples- I read the curatorial essay for the Biennale, found articles and blogs about their work and watched every bit of video I could find on the artists. I think mostly, I wanted him to know how much I knew and appreciated their work on this project, and I wanted to get the perfect footage during our interview.You will start to see clips of the footage showing up on the IMA’s Biennale website, so stay tuned and tell me how I did.

Fast forward four years, (five? I can’t keep track,) and a legitimate scene has developed in Indianapolis. Maybe it’s the hubbub surrounding the Big Game (you know the one), but things are abuzz.

First, there were a few blogs I started to see references to everywhere. I can’t decide if they were simply made more visible to me by social media, but all of a sudden, stylists, photographers, make up artists, dealers, and aficionados started coming out of the woodwork.

Fountain Square and beyond flowered with new, fantastic vintage/local shops like IndySwank, Homespun and Harloh’s. Indy’s own beauty blog, PrettyIndy started – another facet of  a good general style scene.

Then, this past year, the Indianapolis Fashion Collective was founded, to “unite, empower, showcase, and grow the Indianapolis area fashion industry through collaboration, education, and awareness.” I saw recently that they have started a discussion about shared studio space for local designers, a great resource when trying to get a small business off the ground and your basement isn’t cutting it.

Then, at a recent Indy fashion meetup, I heard about Midwest Fashion Week (how have I missed this?) and learned an international style maven moved to Bloomington. We even have a brand new street style blog. It was fun to meet local enthusiasts, designers, stylists and editors all working towards the same passion: advancing Indianapolis’s position on the fashion map.

Now, with intrepid curators Niloo Imami-Paydar and Petra Slinkard at the helm, the IMA has joined the chorus with the Fashion Arts Society, a group for true lovers of Fashion as high art.

Everyone came out for one of the falls most exciting events, the Project IMA Fashion Unbound Runway Show, and stayed to people watch at the Behind the Seams after party, sponsored by FAS.

If you love fashion as I do, consider finding a way to get involved. Join FAS, or the Fashion Collective, or submit to the Midwest Fashion week. It’s the involvement of many individuals that make it something we all want to be a part of. I’ll see you all for the opening of Material World!

Here are three IMA events we have recently posted video of, all of which I saw in person. The funny thing is, in each case I noticed or appreciated something new while watching the video that I had missed during the event.

Former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright joined us recently for the opening of the exhibition Read My Pins: The Madeleine Albright Collection. I was very excited to film her earlier in the day- she is an amazing person and a wonderful role model for women of all ages.

Even though I was live-tweeting the Project IMA: Fashion Unbound Fashion Show, I  saw outfits for the first time when watching this video- they go by so quickly I missed them during the live events! I also loved seeing the materials used by each designer. This show was so much fun!

What is the project?

This is the title graphic for Andy Warhol Enterprises, an exhibition curated by Sarah Green and Allison Unruh, exploring the commercial component of Andy Warhol’s work. For the title graphic, we wanted to explore a design that referenced formal aspects of Warhol’s art including repetition, vibrant colors, and a tight grid. The solution we created, made up of 4000 posters and combined into 20 pads, also provided a unique opportunity for visitors to take a part of the experience home with them.

How did you think of this idea? Why did you do it for Warhol?

I like design that serves double-duty. The invitation I designed for the opening party unfolded into a poster, and I was interested in continuing that re-use wherever it was appropriate. I showed several ideas to our chief designer, David Russick, and we both agreed that creating an interactive title graphic served the functional needs of identifying the exhibition while also exploring how design can be used in a museum to engage visitors in a unique way. Not every exhibition lends itself to this type of treatment, but what could be better than Warhol  for exploring creative design solutions?

How has it been received?

It was installed just prior to the opening party on October 9th, and has been a big hit ever since. One of the things I was interested in documenting was which letters were removed first. The ‘A’ in Andy was nearly depleted during the opening weekend! I was surprised to see the more-difficult-to-reach posters on the top row being depleted first until a visitor pointed out that they wanted part of Andy Warhol’s name.

Will you ever do an ‘interactive’ title graphic again?

I would like to, although the needs of every exhibition are unique and some curators are more willing than others to explore innovative environmental and graphic design. Now that Andy Warhol Enterprises is open and the sky hasn’t fallen, hopefully in the future there will be more opportunities to create memorable and engaging design solutions.

Benjamin and Gaston gave a talk at the Museum after the install, where they showcased both their knowledge of architecture and commitment to their process as well as their wicked senses of humor. In case you missed it, here is the lecture. And if you haven’t seen Gravity’s Loom, get to the Museum as soon as you can!

We hope everyone enjoyed their visit!

Have you had a chance to see it? What do you think?