Over a year ago, Collider joined the 18th Biennale of Sydney, Australia’s largest visual arts event, as design partner.  The brief was to visualise the 2012 campaign, a project that has involved the development of the brand and campaign imagery as well as design and direction of the exhibition catalogue, visitor guides, merchandise, street advertising and key collateral which will surface over the course of the exhibition.

The role of the designer is a sensitive one in the representation of art. Given this Biennale presents a plethora of visual mediums, our biggest challenge was to create an aesthetic that could channel the energy of the artists and ideas of the event rather than impose on them; a design that speaks for the art, not over it.

Evolving the ‘Journey Lines’ concept, used for the 2011 Biennale Paper in Venice, Collider collaborated with artist Zoe Keramea to create the Journey Ribbons (which were based on Keramea’s highly complex pencil studies several metres long). The campaign aims to express the connection between audience experience, the involvement of the major venues such as Cockatoo Island, and the collaborative nature of much of the artwork created especially for each of the sites.