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the letters in your neighborhood

MARCH 8 · The Studio Art Faculty exhibit at Clark University, Form + Content + Context, featured work from 14 artists, including this typographic installation by Jane. Her work began as a sort-of scavenger hunt—just she and her camera, capturing letterforms on street signs & storefronts, manhole covers & newspaper boxes in the vicinity of the gallery. Here’s an excerpt from the statement which accompanied the piece: Typography is designed to be silent; invisible. We see right through it to the declaration underneath the form. But typography also coveys feeling and style—it speaks in its own voice. So in a city we know well, we sometimes need to pull these forms out in order to see them more clearly. When we do, we find they’re as beautiful as calligraphy, full of personality and presence. These letterforms are just a small selection of the millions that make up the face of this city, and this particular neighborhood. If you’re looking carefully enough, you’ll find them somewhere between the corner of Main & Hammond Streets. This is the route I drive to campus everyday. On a recent morning, I walked this route for the first time. It feels entirely different to me now, just for going more slowly, for looking with more curiosity, for letting myself be a traveler in a familiar place.