Kidspace is a gallery and arts program for children that is a collaboration between MASS MoCA and two other local museums. MASS MoCA supports Kidspace in part by providing graphic design for their exhibitions. I was given full responsibility for all design aspects for the show, including a postcard, brochure, and decorative elements and wall text in vinyl.


My first step was to develop the “brand” for the show- I decided to do something classic but not overly colorful or bold to provide contrast to artist Devorah Sperber’s thread spool works. I was inspired by the metal ball-chains from which the work hangs to use dotted lines and a stripe element.


The postcard was fairly straightforward to design- although I intentionally made it fairly symmetrical by centering the mark, often making viewers rotate the card just as the viewing spheres in Devorah’s work flip her upside-down compositions. I used the same tactic to an extent in the inner spread of the brochure as well.


The vinyl was a unique challenge. I’ve never worked with a vinyl cutter, and it took some experimentation to determine what was possible to cut and what was not. I ended up having to forgo the dotted lines, but otherwise, the cutter proved surprisingly capable of fine detail. The glass entrance doors were in part inspired by the etched glass in some of the front doors of the Victorian era houses in my neighborhood in North Adams, and I am very pleased that I was able to execute it nearly exactly as I initially designed it. I also created a challenge for myself in wanting to frame the photograph of Devorah for her bio wall- after much thought and discussion I ended up placing the silver over the vinyl photo print and trimming the excess photo off by hand. I am very pleased with the result.


This entire project was extremely rewarding, and I feel like a much stronger designer and task manager after completing it.

This was one of my favorite designs from my time at MASS MoCA. Kenny Wollesen is a percussionist who also leads an impromptu urban marching band. He came to MASS MoCA to have a week of instrument-making workshops and to perform a concert. Before his arrival, he sent in polaroids of junk items that he wanted us to collect for his workshops, as well as several hand-scrawled notes. This inspired my design- I had a lot of fun thinking of items to represent the information and scanning them to collage together.