Vicious Circles · Repeat Until It Cuts

Why this week's poster

The phrase came first. Vicious circles. A loop that hurts to stay inside.

I wanted the type to enact it. 

Same word, twice.
Same shapes, different colour.
Red discs breaking through where the pattern begins to fail.

The Build

• Objects. Spiked paper discs. Modelled as segmented fans, each blade cut from a single sheet then rotated around a centre point. Three interruptions across the composition.
• Letters. Heavy geometric forms. Wide apertures, generous counters, deliberately simple so the discs read cleanly against them.
• Colour. Cobalt blue over yellow, both on flat black. Red for the discs 〰 the only warm note, kept saturated so it cuts.
• Lighting. Flat soft key. Minimal falloff. The discs carry a slight raised shadow to lift them off the type.
• Texture. Fine corrugation running horizontally through the letterforms. The discs stay smooth 〰 sharp against the ridged type.
• Type. Custom drawn. No tracking work needed 〰 the letters butt against each other and hold the grid.

What worked

• The repetition sells the concept without a caption.
• Red against blue and yellow gives two different tensions from the same disc.
• The corrugation on the type reads as effort. The discs read as interruption.

What I'd push next time

• A third repeat in a muted tone to see where repetition stops adding tension and starts becoming wallpaper.
• Smaller disc variants scattered at the edges.
• A version where the discs sit behind the type instead of over it.

Print Details

• Edition: open weekly release
• Sizes: A3 

Close

The word repeats because the form repeats.
Break the pattern once and the whole composition changes.