By Erin Pierce
Before launching his design career at the Martha Stewart Living magazine in New York, BYU graphic design graduate, Cameron King, designed this year?s theater posters.
The 12-foot-high, bold-colored posters advertising productions such as ?The Two Gentleman of Verona,? ?Fuente Ovejuna? and ?Aida? now adorn the walls and theater entrances of the Harris Fine Arts Center.
?This is the first year that all the theater posters have been done in advance and it is a remarkable accomplishment,? said Ken Crossley, manager of the theater marketing department. ?Cameron not only captured the flavor of all the productions but established a consistent look and feel in the designs.?
Establishing consistency was a challenge considering this year?s theater line-up, with plays set in Egypt, Italy, Midwestern America and Spain. Despite the broad range of locations and time settings, King said the goal was to weave the productions together with a unified presentation style.
?We wanted the posters to explore and state ?theater?: many stories going on at once, many layers and textures both within the characters and within the sets, etc.,? King said. ?I feel that the posters reflect all of those elements.?
The theater department hopes the catchy designs will draw large audiences to the plays, and plans use theater attendance to gauge the posters? effectiveness.
?The visual impact of the posters is incredible,? Crossley said. ?They?re so appealing that people are bound to become more aware .?
King said the posters are large enough to draw attention from potential theatergoers.
?We were hoping that producing them at a larger size would demand attention, cause the viewer to come closer and engage more with the story, as well as enliven the space they would be viewed in,? King said.
King used color, images and phrases to visually describe the plots and themes of each play.
?The tone of the poster must feel the same as the tone of the play, and the colors must reflect that,? Kind said. ?Using a variety of colors and other elements from what the production represents, we create something modern while true to its historical setting.?