If/Then


Tonight (Friday, January 30, 2015) is the opening of the Berkshire Museum's If/Then exhibition. I'll be attending in with my lovely wife Wendi and our super-duper son, Jake. I'm thinking sport coat, white oxford and jeans.

Here's a clip from the official press release that explains what If/Then is all about:


[PITTSFIELD, MA] – The new exhibition If/Then opens Saturday, January 24, 2015, at the Berkshire Museum, and will be on view through Sunday, May 3. Visitors to If/Then will enter a topsy-turvy world of experience, where senses rule. They will traverse the horizontal climbing wall; dodge an obstacle course of pretend laser beams; and use dots and dashes to mark their height on a drawing wall. If/Then was conceived and created by Peter Garlington, a Berkshire-based designer, and Craig Langlois, Berkshire Museum’s education and public program manager. If/Then is proudly sponsored by Greylock Federal Credit Union. 


This new exhibition is all about inspired rule-breaking and the exploration of irrational creativity. For children it is a chance to freely climb, jump, and explore the large-scale sculptural structures in the galleries; for older children and adults it’s an opportunity to release the confines of rational thought and re-engage with their own childhood. The two designers are working with illustrator Greg Matusic to create a visual vocabulary for If/Then, comprised of vibrant symbols and graphics that will guide visitors of all ages through the creative play space without written words. 



It was about a year ago that the three of us took a day trip (45 minutes from Albany, minus a stop at Starbucks) to the Berkshire so Jake and Wendi could show me how cool of a place it was as they'd been there at least once before. In the artsy section of the first floor was an area where kids could sketch a few still life set-ups using the provided (the Berkshire provides LOTS for its visitors) drawing boards, paper and markers. Jake finished his drawing (which was excellent btw) and hung it up on the nearby wall using a provided clip. Since there was a lull in the area I grabbed some materials and created a quick doodle of some kids enjoying themselves at the museum, adding a voice bubble cheer that came pretty close to rhyming. I added a www.matusic.com at the bottom as I tend to do because you never know who's going to see it.


Sure enough, I received an email a few days later from Van Shields, Executive Director of the Berkshire Museum. (See?) Van really liked my drawing and after corresponding a bit more thru email and Facebook he mentioned that he'd keep me in mind for any future museum projects that may need some illustration/cartoon work. Being the eternal optimist it wasn't a matter of if it would happen but when.


So this past Fall I saw an email message from Craig Langlois, the Berkshire Museum's education and public program manager asking if I'd be interested in helping with an upcoming exhibition. Arrangements were made and I arrived at the museum to meet with Craig and Berkshire-based designer, Peter Garlington. They showed me an impressive display of blueprints and plans that showed over a dozen amazingly creative exhibits whose "rules" and instructions would rely on my illustrations. Now I really wanted to work on this project, so I really pitched myself over and over as they described what they had in mind. At one point I said something like, "Man, I'm so jealous you guys get to work on this." Peter replied that I'd be working on it with them. I honestly thought this was an interview for the job, not the first meeting. I suppose it makes for a good story, which is why I'm blogging about it.


The challenge was to create a series of comic strip-style panels that would visually describe to visitors how to navigate each section of the exhibit. We decided on creating and utilizing a number of symbols and icons to show what would be needed for each part of the exhibit (i.e. A boot icons would mean there would be walking involved. A hand icon would mean that sections would be hands-on, etc.) Trying to limit the number of descriptive illustrations to six per panel proved to be tricky in some cases while trying to fill six panels with descriptive illustrations was tricky in others. But based on my extremely intelligent and blatantly honest focus group (Jake), I think we did a pretty good job.

I also created two characters to show/suggest the movements necessary to participate in each each exhibit section. It's weird that these two characters (Are they brother and sister? Cousins? Two old friends? Two new friends maybe?) don't have names, because I usually give names to everything I draw. Good thing I didn't, because the Berkshire will be holding a Name the Kids contest in the near future. I'll post the contact info in another blog post once it's released to the public. Rumor has it that I'll be drawing a fun portrait of the winner(s). Stay tuned.


A thousand or so sketches (yes, all paper not kept is recycled), many hours on my iMac utilizing Adobe Illustrator CC 2014 and a wireless mouse and not nearly as many edits as I had anticipated, here we are: The evening of the official opening of If/Then.

Take your kids. Take your friends. Take yourself. It's an amazing exhibit at a very very cool museum.





Note: The unofficial opening was last Saturday, during a snowstorm of course. I was "trapped" in a cozy converted barn in West Stockbridge, MA that weekend (20 or so minutes South of Pittsfield) with eight of my best children's book illustrator and writer pals for our second annual Little Man Retreat. Lots of critiquing of others work, talking about the industry, sketching, writing, eating, eating, drinking and then eating. I consider these guys and gals to be "my people", so I was very happy that they could visit the museum with me to see the work I had done. It meant a lot.

Here's a link to the Berkshire Eagle's piece on If/Then. On that page are additional links to a photo gallery and a downloadable coloring page contest for the kids.

The additional pics scattered throughout this post were taken during last Sunday's visit with my Little Man peeps. More pics from tonight's opening and our inevitable returns to the exhibit will be on display in future blog posts and on my social media pages.

I'll have a complete lineup of all If/Then illustrations on my web site later this weekend. And if you're interested in any part of the brainstorming and drawing process feel free to contact me in the comment section, via social media or send me an email: greg@matusic.com.


Comments

Gaia said…
Greg! This is so awesome. Thanks so much for writing about the whole process-- I was curious ever since you mentioned it. What a great story too:) It looks fabulous! Congratulations!

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