Encircling the World exhibition catalog design

The Encircling the World exhibition featured international artists whose work is rooted in scientific inquiry. We worked with Massart on this catalog design which featured an intricate laser-cut cover to feature one of the key pieces from the show.

Cover inspiration

Our concept for the cover was of course inspired by the concept of the exhibition! Instead of placing the featured artwork on the cover, we created a reveal with laser cut triangles that allowed the work to peek through. The intention with this choice was to reflect the concept of data, science and the universe. The image used on the cover was The Observable Universe which was key at portraying the concept. The cover uses a black paper with three hits of white ink to make sure the title and information printed on black really popped.

Catalog design that doesn’t distract from the work

We designed the catalog with simple, elegant typography that does not distract from the artwork. Instead, it complimented the scientific concept but allowed the artwork to be the hero on the pages. The inside margins of the page were wide so the art would not get lost in the gutter. To show off the artwork, we repeated full-page images of the art with some pages displaying artists work with full-color background that bleeds to the image.

Check out other work we’ve done for MassArt