study task 2

'Find your Pathway' - Russell Cobb

'Go Deep: the deeper you go the more likely you will discover something of value'

We were given a selection of manifestos to read and analyse, one of the being 'An incomplete manifesto for growth' written by Bruce Mau, which I found the quote above from. I think his manifesto is like a guide to how to be creative, where he gives tips that suggest advice to help people think about their design process. He talks a lot about allowing yourself to experiment, try new things in order to be more creative; like going deeper into your research, which is why I chose this image. 

The different sections showing the figure going deeper into the forest, with the red line pointing in different directions symbolising the various pathways he could take. The sections when the figure is in the forest, he has a jumbled symbol of lines above his head possibly suggesting confusion - that he is still in the experimenting process and the mass of trees could be the mass of ideas he is working his way through. The figure then has the tree growing out of his head which could suggest he has gone through the design process and a valuable idea is beginning to grow after his process of experimenting and researching. So I feel this illustrates the Bruce Mau manifesto well as it draws upon a lot of his points, especially that about the creative process:

'Process is more important that the outcome - when the outcome drives the process we will only ever go to where we've already been. If process drives the outcome we may not know where we're going, but we will know we want to be there'

After reading the 'First things First 1964' manifesto I feel this illustration also draws upon points the text brings up. For example, the manifesto talks about how consumerism is having a negative effect on graphic design, that it is corrupting designer's "skill and imagination" in order to sell "trivial" products like 'stomach powders, detergent…slimming diets, fattening diets' rather that using them for necessary things like 'signs for streets and buildings…instruction manuals…educational aids, films, television features'. I feel like this illustration is not for consumerist or commercial purposes, it was a sort of educational aid because Cobb's brief for the piece was to produce a series of illustrations for a creative skills and development company's annual report - so it is of use to creatives, rather than promoting consumerism.