Desktop Magazine #295

In this month’s physical paper issue of Desktop Magazine I’m interviewed about the nature of key art in Australia, and how our identities and sensibilities shape the key art we produce.

2009, I think; I’ve found the answers I sent in, and copied below.

Desktop Magazine

I’ve been designing key art for the last ten years or so – I’ve worked on key art for very close to 200 films now. I’m not sure I’m any closer to a true understanding of Australian design or films than I was when I started, really Things have certainly improved in Australian key art design over the last ten years. When I first arrived here it was mostly dreadful – trying very very hard to be as big and generic-Hollywood-on-a-budget as possible – but nowadays there’s definitely more interesting ideas around, and some really good designers, like Marcus Cobbledick at Madman and Jonathan Cocolas at Carnival. Some of that improvement is to do with the nature of small nation filmmaking – it’s generally more arthouse, less formulaic, and less package-driven, so the key art can reflect that. And some of it is to do with the changing nature of movie posters generally: the trailer, previews, interviews and reviews are now all available at the click of a button, so the job of the key art is less to try to sell a ticket to an otherwise uninformed punter, and more to encourage further investigation of the film. So the trailer can do the job of explaining the plot, and the key art can focus on the tone, the themes, the mood, of the film. These more ephemeral things are much harder to express but much more rewarding when they succeed.

The only important job for the key art designer is to accurately reflect the film, to find the purest way of expressing the idea of the film and contorting their style and technique and references in service of that idea and express it in a single, memorable image that intrigues. And that’s true of any area of graphic design – the mode of your expression has to be led by the product or the idea you’re trying to communicate, and not the other way around. That’s why I’m not really keen on the current trend of redesigned minimalist posters for movies: it’s all about the designer imposing their will on the film, rather than the other way around. Which is fine as an aim in itself, but it’s not where the real work lies.

I’m not sure that there is an Australian style of film, or of key art that reflects that. Last year’s commercial and critical successes were as diverse as The Sapphires and Hail – other than both being films made on the same piece of earth there’s really nothing to connect them. I think in terms of Australian key art design there’s probably the often-commented-on love of colour, due to the strong clear sunlight here (and I’m certainly guilty of using ALL the colours whenever possible). Maybe a sense of scale, too. But I’m probably standing too close to the wall to see the overall picture. I just try to approach each project as honestly and as openly as possible and see where it takes me.