Image captions:
1. COOL #4, a magazine by Bulldozer Press.
2. Photo of Yang Meanyoung.
3. Sarah Poster, commissioned by index.
Interview details
Narrator: YANG Meanyoung
Interviewer: Zara Arshad
Interpreter: LEE Sol
Date: Tuesday 25 June 2019
Location: The designer’s studio in Seoul, South Korea
Length: approx. 1 hour, 26 minutes
“Yang Meanyoung is a graphic designer, freelancer, and her outcome is usually printed matter - designing books, magazines and other publications.
[...]
COOL magazine is one of her self-initiated projects. This is about clothing and style, rather than fashion. She doesn’t refer to the publication as a fashion magazine because she feels there are many prejudices within fashion [...] she was interested in fashion from a young age, but when she looked through fashion magazines, she wasn’t able to find the content or information that she wanted to see or know, so she decided to make her own magazine.
[...]
When the founder of GRAPHIC magazine opened his bookstore, called index, he asked designers to make a poster [...] so she made this poster [Sarah Poster]. The intent was for people see this as a person’s name. So in Korean, when you read this in Korean [...] it means ‘buy this poster’. When people walk into the bookstore, they see this poster and it is like an order: ‘You buy [this] poster’. So this also related to the title of COOL magazine because when she choose this word ‘cool’ for the magazine title, she was thinking many fashion people say fashion is cool, but she wondered: ‘What’s the meaning of “cool” - what does “cool” mean?’. Also in graphic design people say something is cool, but uhm when you say cool for when something is nice, it’s a really subjective concept. But when you visualise ‘cool’ or ‘cold’, people can’t deny this is ‘cold’, so she did this [with many of her works]. This is a visual pun, if you like.
[...]
To summarise, she thinks ‘cool’ and puns, language or visual puns, are the keywords of her projects. She thinks that this is possible because she’s a Korean living in Korea - we see English everyday but we don’t feel or understand it as a native speaker does, so she thinks this is a kind of work, which is possible as a Korean living in Seoul [...] when we see English, it’s not just language. It’s visual to us first, so [...] you see the alphabet or language as visual elements, and you can use it as graphic elements with Korean language.
[...]
As a co-founder of the Feminist Designer Social Club (FDSC), Meanyoung organised a sports day. The thinking behind this event was that graphic designer is someone who works seated for a really long time and it’s not good for their health. So in order to work longer, better health is required. However, the sports day Meanyoung organised was not really to work out in the end, but to make a chance, make a opportunity for the FDSC members to get to know one another, and to network. More symbolically, in Korea, usually in schools [...] normally, the sports field is not for girls. It’s mainly for boys [...] so this was an event where the woman can just work out and not worry about what others think.”
Biography:
(b. 1987, Seoul) Yang Meanyoung is a freelance graphic designer and a co-initiator of the Feminist Designer Social Club. She is also founder of Bulldozer Press, COOL magazine, and of the Otjungri and Swatch Service projects. Yang Meanyoung completed her undergraduate degree in human environmental design at Yonsei University, a programme that included an exchange with Hong Kong PolyU, before continuing her education at Paju Typography Institute.
meanyounglamb.com
Feminist Designer Social Club Instagram
Feminist Designer Social Club Twitter
1. COOL #4, a magazine by Bulldozer Press.
2. Photo of Yang Meanyoung.
3. Sarah Poster, commissioned by index.
Interview details
Narrator: YANG Meanyoung
Interviewer: Zara Arshad
Interpreter: LEE Sol
Date: Tuesday 25 June 2019
Location: The designer’s studio in Seoul, South Korea
Length: approx. 1 hour, 26 minutes
“Yang Meanyoung is a graphic designer, freelancer, and her outcome is usually printed matter - designing books, magazines and other publications.
[...]
COOL magazine is one of her self-initiated projects. This is about clothing and style, rather than fashion. She doesn’t refer to the publication as a fashion magazine because she feels there are many prejudices within fashion [...] she was interested in fashion from a young age, but when she looked through fashion magazines, she wasn’t able to find the content or information that she wanted to see or know, so she decided to make her own magazine.
[...]
When the founder of GRAPHIC magazine opened his bookstore, called index, he asked designers to make a poster [...] so she made this poster [Sarah Poster]. The intent was for people see this as a person’s name. So in Korean, when you read this in Korean [...] it means ‘buy this poster’. When people walk into the bookstore, they see this poster and it is like an order: ‘You buy [this] poster’. So this also related to the title of COOL magazine because when she choose this word ‘cool’ for the magazine title, she was thinking many fashion people say fashion is cool, but she wondered: ‘What’s the meaning of “cool” - what does “cool” mean?’. Also in graphic design people say something is cool, but uhm when you say cool for when something is nice, it’s a really subjective concept. But when you visualise ‘cool’ or ‘cold’, people can’t deny this is ‘cold’, so she did this [with many of her works]. This is a visual pun, if you like.
[...]
To summarise, she thinks ‘cool’ and puns, language or visual puns, are the keywords of her projects. She thinks that this is possible because she’s a Korean living in Korea - we see English everyday but we don’t feel or understand it as a native speaker does, so she thinks this is a kind of work, which is possible as a Korean living in Seoul [...] when we see English, it’s not just language. It’s visual to us first, so [...] you see the alphabet or language as visual elements, and you can use it as graphic elements with Korean language.
[...]
As a co-founder of the Feminist Designer Social Club (FDSC), Meanyoung organised a sports day. The thinking behind this event was that graphic designer is someone who works seated for a really long time and it’s not good for their health. So in order to work longer, better health is required. However, the sports day Meanyoung organised was not really to work out in the end, but to make a chance, make a opportunity for the FDSC members to get to know one another, and to network. More symbolically, in Korea, usually in schools [...] normally, the sports field is not for girls. It’s mainly for boys [...] so this was an event where the woman can just work out and not worry about what others think.”
Biography:
(b. 1987, Seoul) Yang Meanyoung is a freelance graphic designer and a co-initiator of the Feminist Designer Social Club. She is also founder of Bulldozer Press, COOL magazine, and of the Otjungri and Swatch Service projects. Yang Meanyoung completed her undergraduate degree in human environmental design at Yonsei University, a programme that included an exchange with Hong Kong PolyU, before continuing her education at Paju Typography Institute.
meanyounglamb.com
Feminist Designer Social Club Instagram
Feminist Designer Social Club Twitter