A Pattern Language

We make sense of the world by recognizing patterns, an exigency of survival we inherited from our Neanderthal aunts and uncles. (No, not the ones who came out the woodwork to swig down the open bar at your wedding.) It was a matter of life and death for them: interpret the repetition inherent in nature, or be eaten. Fortunately, in a life full of modern amenities like GPS, rifles, and open bars, we're allowed to be lazy. But that doesn't mean that somewhere in the backs of our heads we don't still have a taste for order, repetition, and structure. Well, given the fact that there are a billion Denny's, maybe it's still in the front of our heads. So while you're enjoying that Lumberjack Slam breakfast this morning, feast on the above posters. (Click to enlarge.)

These screenprinted concert posters, all done by other designers, employ simple patterning to make a statement. My personal favs are the first two, though they aren't necessarily the best looking. What I like is the design decision to overprint a pattern without regard to what's beneath it.

It's our Neanderthal forebears we can thank for making that design decision a deft one instead of a dumb one. From the first homo erectus who roamed the earth (Strom Thurman?), through the ensuing half million years (YEC's: insert 6,000 years here), we've developed not only the capacity to recognize patterns, but -- equally as important -- the ability to turn them off in our mind. That's key here. We're able to spot a moose in the first poster precisely because cavemen needed to spot a moose. His survival depended on it. Just think, if he wasn't able to pick out the moose through all the trees, he couldn't kill it; he'd get no breakfast, and we wouldn't have Denny's.

Posters are by Aesthetic Apparatus, Heads of State, The Small Stakes, Yeehaw Industries, and Methane Studios. This post's title is a hat tip to Christopher Alexander.