SORT LATER was the 2023 RISD GD Senior Show, hosted at the Woods-Gerry Gallery of Undergraduate Exhibitions.
As part of the exhibition team, my responsibilities included assisting with the creation of a visual identity and adapting it into an interactive installation, website, and concert animation. In order to capture the eclectic and diverse range of the graduating class, we agreed upon a collective theme that allows for a casual workflow and experimentation—“SORT LATER”. Therefore, all parts of the exhibition involve the creative merging of both print and digital design mediums.
Check out the curatorial statement:
Design is a form of sorting. The designer takes disparate elements and strings them together; remixed and recombined. Charged with the unending task of forging new connections, we have tediously aligned type to page, gathered content for books, and compiled assets for websites. While discursive, sorting becomes a way to retain control. It implies a tangible end to the process. So often, each design decision leads to some envisioned 'end.' sort later is about letting go of ideas of finality and instead celebrating the work in progress, the liminal, and the unanswered. Our time in the RISD GD community has been akin to sorting seeds and tending to a garden. The process can lead to joyful successes and frustrating challenges. This exhibition recognizes incidental flourishes, unexpected beauty, and progress in full bloom. When we remove the expectation of finality, we are rewarded with the process of growth. As a community, we have formed an entangled root system to support one another. This garden is our foundation to perpetuate through countless trials, experimentations, and adjustments.
The senior class wishes to present our work with the acknowledgement that this is a celebration of process and new beginnings as much as it is the end results of our time at risd. We're excited to present our procedural abundance and communal fortitude, and we don't blame the viewer if they're overwhelmed. If that's the case, we suggest you SORT LATER.
