Notes about Aporia by Andrew Waits

Andrew Waits is the winner of the third edition of the Fiebre Dummy Award, and to better understand his work, Aporia, he has shared with us some details of the book in terms of typography chosen, the texts that accompany the images or some influences.

Please remember that the fourth edition of the Fiebre Dummy Award is open here. And if you are interested in getting a copy of Aporia please order yours here.

FONT

The font used for the title of APORIA is called MAD Serif, released in 2017 by the designer, Dries Wiewauters. Dries was fascinated with CAD and how the program’s inherent typeface arose. MAD Serif is a reinterpretation that tried to make the most of its grid-based nature. It is a tribute to historical and forgotten form.

MAD is an acronym for Machine Aided Design, a direct reference to CAD (Computer-Aided Design), which reveals the typeface’s starting point. Since early printing of CAD plans were done with plotters that drew every single line of the instruction, special typefaces had to be designed for the dimensions and other information. These were constructed out of lines and not outlines of shapes. With their rendering dictated by the resolution of the output device, their final form was not fixed.

The designer, Aaron Bloom first brought MAD Serif to my attention and it seemed to mesh perfectly with the aesthetic of the work and some of the themes running throughout.

TEXT

APORIA contains four pieces of text inspired by the short 1961 film, Critique of Separation, by the French artist and philosopher, Guy Debord. Debord’s work with the Situationists, and the concept of psychogeography and the dérive were very important in helping me to understand what this work was, and could become. The following four pieces of text accompany the four chapters in APORIA. They help to unlock the themes of each chapter, yet in a way, are aporetic statements in themselves.

It is the crossroads

Where we have found

And lost ourselves.

We don’t know what to say.

Words are formed into sequences

Gestures are recognized

Outside us.

Here is daylight,

And here are perspectives

That now no longer mean anything.

What cannot be forgotten reappears in dreams.

At the end of this type of dream, half asleep,

The events are still for a brief moment taken as real.

INFLUENCES / RESONANCES

More about Aporia, here.

Thanks!