This is a poster found on Pinterest, designed by a company called Wirtheim Design Studio. It’s a self-commissioned poster for The Victory Garden of Tomorrow. This a good example of the use of colour in urban farming because of their earthy colour palette.
The Victory Garden of Tomorrow is a company that sells posters relating to Urban Farming. They represent healthy propaganda, posters and goods that express their desire for better food, better gardens and better communities. The artist and designer of their posters goes by the name of Joe Wirtheim, who has appeared in The New York Times. Their work is mainly produced in Portland, Oregon (The Victory Garden of Tomorrow, n.d.).
The poster chosen has a colour palette of greens and browns which are very earthy tones and relate directly to the farming aspect of urban farming. The different colour tones have been used to create depth with shadows and highlights, and with the background being a very dull, flat tone of green, it adds composition and draws more attention to the foot and pitchfork. The background also contains conceptual design with the plants growing out of the city buildings; this creates a link between urban and farming. The tiny details that have been placed within the poster, such as the patterned sole, the worm in the soil and the fabric patch on the trousers, also shows the audience what is meant to look more forward. Edward Tufte said, “Pure, bright or very strong colors have loud, unbearable effects when they stand unrelieved over large areas adjacent to each other, but extraordinary effects can be achieved when they are used sparingly on or between dull backgrounds” (Gist, n.d.), which correlates with the composition of the poster. The white and brown text at the top and bottom of the poster is very easily readable against the light green sky and the brown soil, and the fonts used make the message of the poster clear and direct to the audience.
Tilth Alliance works within the community of Washington farmers and gardeners to build a sustainable, healthy and equitable food future (www.tilthalliance.org, n.d.). This is a bad example of the use of colour relating to urban farming because of the choice of colours used.
When looking at this poster no immediate areas stand out: the colours used are blue, orange, brown, white and a dash of green. The brown and the small amount of green are the only colours used that could represent Urban Farming, the blues and oranges do not relate to the subject, and the way the colours have been used make everything look very flat. There are no different tones being used, they are all very different colours. There could have been some depth added with different shades of the colours, which would make certain areas of the poster stand out more to the viewer. The colours used in the text are brown and white, which could have been easily readable if the font chosen was thicker and more spacious, especially all the text in the lower half of the poster.
The colour palette used for this poster was inspired by the ‘Break New Grounds’ poster, the greens and browns relating directly to farming and plants. The initial structure of the Tilth poster has remained the same, the blues and oranges have been removed and replaced with shades of green and tints of brown. The shades of green and brown have been used to create shadows on the growing plant and the bird flying above. Most of the text has been replaced with a thicker, white font, which now makes the most important information stand out.
Bibliography
Gist. (n.d.). Edward Tufte on Use of Color. [online] Available at: https://gist.github.com/deadprogram/782074#file-gistfile1-txt [Accessed 31 Oct. 2021].
Tilth Alliance. (n.d.). Available at: https://i.pinimg.com/originals/a2/40/83/a2408387bd4981b8e904f2b52b2135d8.png [Accessed 18 Oct. 2021].
The Victory Garden of Tomorrow. (n.d.). The Victory Garden of Tomorrow. [online] Available at: https://www.victorygardenoftomorrow.com/ [Accessed 18 Oct. 2021].
Wirtheim, J. (n.d.). Break New Grounds. Available at: https://i.pinimg.com/564x/87/94/73/879473f5f095f6986f9ac579aedf69e3.jpg [Accessed 18 Oct. 2021].
www.tilthalliance.org. (n.d.). About Us — Tilth Alliance. [online] Available at: http://www.tilthalliance.org/about [Accessed 18 Oct. 2021].