Space & hierarchy · Hierarchy
Single focal point
One unmistakable point of entry.
A design choice in Stylogeny’s vocabulary, under space & hierarchy: how is attention distributed?
- styles make it
- 235
- as a defining choice
- 67
- as a usual one
- 124
- now and then
- 44
- avoid it
- 8
Styles defined by it 67
For these styles it is one of the choices that make the style.
- Ottoman Tughra & Dîvânî Chancery CalligraphyThe Ottoman sultan's calligraphic monogram and the chancery hand written beneath it.
- Zoomorphic & Figural Calligraphy (Islamic Calligrams)Pictorial writing in which the strokes of a devotional text form one figure: a lion of ʿAli built from the Nad-e ʿAli prayer, a galleon whose hull spells the names of the Seven Sleepers, a peacock, a Sufi cap.
- Đông Hồ & Hàng Trống Folk PrintsVietnam's two classic folk-print schools, bought for Tết. Đông Hồ families press each colour from its own carved block onto giấy điệp, dó paper brushed with ground scallop shell whose streaked, faintly sparkling surface serves as the white, and print the black line last.
- Kalighat Pat & Battala Bazaar PrintsThe bazaar art of nineteenth-century Calcutta: watercolours sold to pilgrims by patua painters at the Kalighat temple, and the cheap woodcuts and metal engravings that Battala presses printed for chapbooks and almanacs.
- Indian Calendar & Bazaar ArtMass-printed images of Hindu deities, epic scenes, saints, nationalist heroes and film stars, sold in bazaars and given away as business calendars, from the chromolithographs of the Calcutta Art Studio and Ravi Varma Press to Sivakasi offset.
- Senegalese Sufi Devotional Imagery (Souwère Glass Painting and Amadou Bamba Portraits)The devotional imagery of Senegal's Sufi brotherhoods, above all the Mourides: reverse paintings on glass (souwère), made in Senegal's cities since about 1900, and the murals, banners, prints and photocopies that multiply one 1913 photograph of Sheikh Amadou Bamba across Dakar and Touba.
- Taishō Roman & Lyrical IllustrationThe lyrical illustration (jojōga) of late-Meiji to early-Shōwa Japan, led by Takehisa Yumeji: willowy, large-eyed women in kimono drawn with an Art Nouveau contour, set among camellias and kimono patterns and lettered by hand.
- AIZ Political Photomontage (Heartfield)The political photomontage John Heartfield made for the communist weekly AIZ from 1930 to 1938, in Berlin and, from 1933, in Prague exile.
- Vietnamese Propaganda Poster (Tranh cổ động)The state poster art of Vietnam from the 1945 August Revolution to today.
- Greek Tourism Modernism (EOT)The modernist image of Greece made for the National Tourism Organisation (EOT) by Michalis Katzourakis, its art adviser in 1960-1967, and by Frederick Carabott, who advised it until 1967; in 1962 the two also founded the K&K Athens Advertising Centre.
- Palestinian Resistance PosterThe poster culture of the Palestinian national movement after 1965, issued by the PLO and its factions from Beirut and other Arab capitals for refugee camps, homes and solidarity audiences abroad.
- Picó Sound-System Painting (Colombian Caribbean)The hand-painted fronts of the picós, the giant sound systems that play dances in the barrios of Barranquilla and Cartagena.
- Atelier Populaire (May '68 Screenprint Poster)The posters of the Atelier populaire, set up when students, teachers and artists occupied the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris on 14 May 1968, until police cleared the school on 27 June.
- Grapus (French Militant Graphic Collective)The posters and identities of Grapus, a Paris collective founded in 1970 by Communist Party members who had met in the 1968 poster workshops.
- Roots Reggae Sleeve Art & Rasta IconographyThe record sleeves of roots reggae, from Catch a Fire (1973) until dancehall took over in the 1980s.
- Post-Punk Record Sleeve (Stiff, Factory, 4AD)The record sleeves that British art-school designers made after punk, for independent labels and some majors: Barney Bubbles at Stiff, Malcolm Garrett for Buzzcocks, Peter Saville at Factory and 23 Envelope at 4AD.
- Black Metal GraphicsThe visual language of black metal, fixed by Norway's second wave in the early 1990s, now worldwide, since the 2010s borrowed by mainstream acts (Szpajdel's Rihanna and Metallica logos, 2016).
- YouTube Thumbnail Style (the 'YouTube Face')The custom thumbnail of YouTube's creator economy: a 16:9 still made to be read at fingernail size in a feed of recommendations.
- 'Good Morning' Greeting Images (WhatsApp Forward Vernacular)The ready-made greeting pictures that millions of smartphone users, many of them older and new to the internet, forward to family, friends and groups each morning on WhatsApp, above all in India and Brazil.
- Lo-fi Anime AestheticThe look of YouTube's 24/7 lo-fi hip hop streams.
- Palestinian Watermelon and Keffiyeh GraphicsGraphics of Palestinian identity and of solidarity with Palestinians, made by Palestinian artists, the diaspora and supporters worldwide and shared mainly online, above all since the Gaza war began in October 2023.
- Woman, Life, Freedom Protest Graphics (Iran and the Diaspora)Posters and digital graphics made in Iran and the diaspora after Mahsa (Jina) Amini died in morality-police custody in September 2022.
Styles that often use it 124
A characteristic choice: usual in these styles, though not essential.
- Javanese Wayang Kulit (Tatah Sungging)The visual language of Javanese shadow puppets: flat figures cut from buffalo parchment, with head and legs in profile, shoulders turned to the front and long jointed arms worked by horn rods.
- Ten Bamboo Studio Colour Woodblock (Douban & Gonghua)A kind of colour woodblock printing begun in late-Ming Nanjing, made so that a print looks like a brush painting.
- Northwest Coast Formline DesignThe two-dimensional design system of the northern Northwest Coast nations, painted, carved and woven onto boxes, house fronts, robes and hats, and printed as serigraphs since the 1960s.
- Thai Yantra (Yant) DiagramsThai protective diagrams in which Pali formulae, written in Khom, a sacred script derived from Khmer, are packed into squares, circles, triangles, spires and the outlines of Buddhas, monks and tigers, often framed by lines of script.
- Bezalel SchoolThe house style of the Bezalel School of Arts and Crafts, opened in Jerusalem by Boris Schatz in 1906 with E.
- Russian ConstructivismConstructivism rejected art for art's sake in favour of the artist-engineer building useful things for the new Soviet society.
- Estridentismo (Stridentist) GraphicsMexico's first avant-garde (1921-27), launched when Manuel Maples Arce pasted his manifesto Actual No. 1 on Mexico City walls.
- Italian Fascist Graphics (Romanità & Exhibition Photomontage)The visual language of Italian Fascism, which turned modernist means to a cult of Rome and of the Duce.
- Brazilian Modernismo Graphics (Klaxon and the Semana de 22)The print side of São Paulo's Modernismo (1922-29), set in jobbing print shops.
- Amazonian Boat Lettering (Abridores de Letras)The painted boat names of Pará's rivers in the Brazilian Amazon, made for about a century by self-taught riverside painters (abridores de letras).
- Nippon Kōbō & Tōhōsha Photo-Propaganda Magazines (NIPPON & FRONT)Luxury photo-propaganda magazines that imperial Japan sent abroad, 1934–45.
- Casablanca School Graphic ModernismA postcolonial modernism formed at the Casablanca fine-art school under Farid Belkahia, where Mohamed Melehi, Mohammed Chabâa and colleagues set Amazigh rugs and jewellery, painted ceilings and calligraphy beside a Bauhaus-style merging of art, craft and design.
- Mexico 68 Olympic & Metro IdentityThe graphic programme of the 1968 Mexico City Olympics and the city's first Metro line.
- Black Panther Party GraphicsThe visual language of the Black Panther Party, created largely by its Minister of Culture, Emory Douglas, for the weekly newspaper The Black Panther.
- Ultras Graphics (Curva Banners and Tifo)The graphic language of Italy's organised football supporters, the ultras, from the late 1960s, and of the groups that copied them across Europe, North Africa and beyond.
- Ethiopian Revolutionary Poster (Derg Era)The poster and mural art of the Derg military government and its successor, Mengistu's People's Democratic Republic of Ethiopia (1974–1991), made mostly by teachers and students of the Addis Ababa School of Fine Arts.
- Iranian Revolutionary & Sacred Defence PosterPosters, murals and stamps of the 1978–79 Iranian Revolution and the 1980–88 war with Iraq, which fused the red-white-black international revolutionary poster with Persian miniature and coffeehouse narrative painting.
- Pardhan Gond Painting (Jangarh Kalam)Painting on paper and canvas by Pardhan Gond artists of Patangarh and Bhopal, begun when Bharat Bhavan, Bhopal, recruited Jangarh Singh Shyam in 1981; the style was later named Jangarh Kalam after him.
- Nigerian Pentecostal Crusade Poster & BillboardThe roadside adverts of Nigeria's Pentecostal and independent churches: billboards, banners and posters on poles, walls and bridges announcing crusades, revivals, conventions and night vigils.
- Indian Pop-Kitsch Design (Desi Kitsch)Urban Indian gift and T-shirt design from the late 1990s into the 2010s that recasts the street and bazaar as ironic, affectionate icons: truck tails and 'Horn OK Please', auto-rickshaws, Ambassadors and Chetaks, cutting chai, old Bollywood stills and dialogues, Bhagat Singh in place of Che.
- Tamil Nadu Flex BannersThe digitally printed vinyl boards, locally called flex banners, that fan clubs, party cadres, businesses and families have put up along the roads of Tamil Nadu since about 2000, as flex displaced hand-painted cinema banners and cut-outs over the following decade.
- Internet Ugly & Meme VernacularA deliberately amateur image dialect of forums, imageboards and social feeds, named 'Internet Ugly' by Nick Douglas in 2014.
- Oaxacan Protest Printmaking & Street Graphics (ASARO)The street graphics of Oaxaca City since the 2006 teachers' strike and APPO uprising, when ASARO, the stencil collective Lapiztola and later workshops such as Colectivo Subterráneos made the colonial centre's walls a newspaper.
- Hong Kong Protest Art (Umbrella Movement to the 2019–20 Protests)The graphics of Hong Kong's democracy protests, from the 2014 Umbrella Movement to the national security law of 2020, in two linked media.
- VTuber Avatar and Stream GraphicsThe graphic kit of virtual YouTubers, streamers who perform behind an animated anime-style character instead of their own face.
Styles that use it now and then 44
An occasional choice in these styles.
- Chinese Calligraphy & Seal Carving (Shufa & Zhuanke)c. 0–present
- Persian Miniature (Ilkhanid, Timurid and Safavid Book Painting)c. 1300–1700
- Tibetan Woodblock Print Culture (Pecha & Prayer Flags)c. 1410–present
- Rinpa & Saga-bon1600–present
- Lubok Popular Print1650–1920
- Imagerie d'Épinal & European Bilderbogen1796–1939
- Persian Popular Narrative (Lithographs & Coffeehouse Painting)1843–2012
- Cuban Tobacco Lithography (Habilitaciones & Marquillas)1845–present
- Mexican Popular Graphics (Posada)1880–1917
- Nieuwe Kunst (Dutch Art Nouveau)1892–1914
- Guna Mola1900–present
- London Transport Design1908–1966
- Arnhem Land Bark Painting & Rarrk1912–present
- Bauhaus1919–1933
- ROSTA Windows1919–1922
- Die Neue Typographie1923–1940
- Penguin Paperback Design (Three Bands to the Marber Grid)1935–1972
- Ndebele Geometric Painting1940–present
- Fotoromanzo (Italian Photo-Romance)1947–present
- Onitsha Market Pamphlets1947–1980
- Story Manga (Postwar Japanese Comics)1947–present
- Argentine Adventure Historieta (Oesterheld–Breccia)1948–1996
- Bonelli Fumetto (Italian Popular Adventure Comics)1948–present
- Arab Children's Comic Magazines (Samir to Majid)1956–present
- Bossa Nova Sleeve Modernism (César Villela and Elenco)1960–1968
- Soviet Central Asian Ornamental Modernism1966–1999
- Amar Chitra Katha Comics1967–present
- Kinshasa Popular Painting1970–present
- Warli Painting1970–present
- Western Desert Iconography1971–present
- Métal hurlant Science-Fiction Comics (Mœbius, Druillet & Les Humanoïdes Associés)1974–1987
- La Movida Madrileña Graphics1977–1988
- Jamaican Dancehall Signs & Sleeve Art1980–present
- Torres Strait Islander Linocut1991–present
- Bitterkomix (Afrikaans Underground Comics)1992–present
- Superflat1993–present
- Contemporary Chinese Book Design ('Most Beautiful Books of China')2003–present
- Seoul Independent Graphic Design (Small-Studio Scene)2005–present
- Flat Design2010–2016
- Egyptian Revolutionary Street Art (Mohamed Mahmoud Murals)2011–2014
- Vaporwave2011–2017
- Material Design2014–present
- Book Blob (Abstract Colour-Blob Literary Fiction Cover)2019–2023
- Instagram Slideshow Activism (Social-Justice Infographics)2020–present
It often goes with
Choices that the styles making it make more often than the atlas as a whole.
- Isolated objectin 167 of 235
- Stylised figurationin 176 of 235
- All capsin 128 of 235
- Painterly illustrationin 109 of 235
- Emblems & badgesin 115 of 235
- Naturalistic depictionin 103 of 235
Styles that avoid it
Styles that deliberately leave it out.
- Batik Pattern Tradition1600–present
- Taiwan Floral Cloth (Huabu)1950–present
- Situationist Détournement Graphics1956–1972
- Cranbrook & Deconstructivist Typography1980–1998
- Japanese Dense Web Design1999–present
- Danmaku Bullet-Comment Overlay2006–present
- Polish Information Picture Book (Dwie Siostry)2008–present
- Data Humanism2014–present