Chris Hamamoto

Lost Art: Deaccessioned Art from the RISD Museum

Lost Art is a catalog of all the items deaccessioned from the RISD Museum over the last 99 years. The catalog is organized in three parts: sold objects, traded objects, and destroyed objects.

Limited Edition

Developed during a workshop with designer Leonardo Sonnoli, the project’s brief was to promote “something we hate”. In collaboration with Minji Lee, Woo Chung, and Jonathan Yamakami, we chose to address the issue of “Limited Editions”, which we perceive to be the creation of false scarcity. Examining the attributes of limited editions; small production runs, special materials, designer or event editions, we created a notebook that synthesized these elements. Editions were produced for the professors involved in the workshop, us who made the product, and one other student in the class. This last edition was given away at random, in an attempt to inspire a special feeling in the recipient, and jealousy in those who did not receive it.

Cornell AAP

College of AAP (Architecture, Art and Planning) in Ithaca hosts a series of events and lectures throughout the year. During Summer 2012 I helped Studio Kudos redesign their quarterly newsletter.

We tried to take advantage of the medium through use of neon inks, full bleed imagery, and dynamic layouts – making for a rewarding, tangible, reading experience.

Designers & Books Fair 2012

The first Designers & Books Fair took place in October 2012 at FIT Conference Center. It featured esteemed publishers, booksellers and some of the most celebrated names in the world of design.

Working with Studio Kudos I designed the website, and helped establish components of the graphic identity.

Color Collection

For James Goggin’s Spring 2012 Graduate Visiting Designers workshop we were asked to explore a museum’s collection and establish a personal narrative through atypical connections, points of view, undiscovered histories, etc.

I explored the MoMa’s graphic design collection, focusing on how formal aspects – specifically color – linked these works across time and style – and how this analysis could provide new ways for the audience to engage with the artworks in the gallery. Inspired by Tauba Auerbach’s RGB colospace atlas, and Hiroshi Sugimoto’s Polaroid photography, I created a narrative based solely on color. Using a computer script to rearrange the pixels in a digital photograph, I obtained images of the work currently on display in the MoMA’s graphic design collection, and reduced them all to colored gradients. I then created a sequence based on the progression of color, that illustrates connections between works based on their era, movement they prescribed to, or materials used in construction. It’s primary intention is to be a booklet to accompany a visitor as they move throughout MoMA’s galleries, it also includes an index with the original images, so colors can be seen in their original context.

Camus Series

135x190mm | Self-initiated | Design, concept, & production

Camus, one of my favorite authors, books deal with fundamental issues of life, and life’s meaning. In designing a cover for a Camus book I thought it fitting to represent Camus’ fundamental content with fundamental shapes: the circle and square. Each book cover treats these shapes in different ways; The Stranger evokes staring at the sun, The Plague represents the dissemination of a virus and its spiraling effects, and The Fall distorts the shape of the square with circular pulses.

FontCast

Screen-based | FontShop | Camera, typography, & concepts

FontCast is a conversation with the most interesting figures in typography and graphic design. A series of video podcasts, FontCast explores everything from the founding of the FontShop to the fundamentals of kerning. One of FontCast’s primary goals is to make type and typography more accesible, revealing the personalities practicing the crafts as well as their creative and technical processes.

I conceptualized episodes, designed the title, credit, and question cards, edited early episodes, and filmed the Jim Parkinson and Damon Styer interviews. Stephen Coles conducted and filmed all other interviews. Stradivari Sibulboro mixed and mastered the audio. gs edited, color-corrected, upscaled the footage to HD, and created animations for episodes 7 and beyond. All episodes of FontCast can be seen here.

UC Davis Design Museum Exhibition Mailer

152×229 mm | UC Davis Design Museum | Design, & concept

Perpetual calendar and yearly mailer for the University of California Davis Design Museum’s year of Eco-Exhibitions. Print is almost inherently contrary to sustainability, using paper and energy that often literally gets thrown out. The mailer doubles as a perpetual calendar, meant to have an after-life after its initial use.

MVB Fonts-In-Use

Screen-based | MVB Fonts | Design

MVB Fonts is the foundry of Mark Van Bronkhorst. Van Bronkhorst has been producing high caliber fonts for over 20 years. I have a special affinity to Mark since he’s located in the same city as my family home. These graphic pairs were produced to promote the revamped Verdigris family for its “Pro” release.

Warren Marr @ Descanso Gardens

Various media | With Guidance from Tim McNeil | Design, & concept

Warren Marr @ Descanso Gardens was a team project where the objective was to design a photo exhibition in the Descanso Gardens on Warren Marr’s Photography. It involved designing the basic identity, floor plan and even the architecture. We’ve studied green architecture and applied our research to the project.

Collaboration with Haemi Yoon.

Focus

Various media | With guidance from Gale Okumura | Design, & concept

Focus is an advertising-awarness campaign. Focus’ goal was to make young people aware of the invasive nature of marketing. We crafted the graphics and headlines to emulate “lifestyle” branding – attempting to use the same tactics as large-scale advertisers to surprise perception. The copy and images play up the contrast of suburban-teenage ennui and the excitement promised by advertisements. We were purposely cryptic, hoping to impart a slightly uneasy feeling to the viewer. Our emphasis was on emotions rather than content, hoping to pique a curiosity in the topic that would lead to research of advertising methods.

Pieces include brochure, promotional posters, flyers, newspaper advertisment, bus side, billboard and website.

Focus was a collaboration with Milan Phan and gs.