Xueqi Kong
I am a graphic designer, mainly engaged in printing and image design. I like to engage in interesting and bold story creation, and use bright colors and hu-morous images to express. I am used to paying attention to people’s psycho-logical problems and exploring the exciting possibility between people’s emotions and design. I also often use photography or illustration as visual tools during my working process.
Typeface
I paying attention to people’s mental health problems. In recent years, more and more people feel bodyshame. According to the research, the reason why most people feel insecure is that they are ridiculed by others.I extracted this shape, like a smiling mouth, which means that your ridicule of others’ appearance may cause harm to others. So I extracted the keyword ‘ridicule’ and converted it into a figure, like the shape of a mouth. I decided to apply this shape to the font design and give some meaning to the font, such as “mocking language”.
Image Design
In recent years the rise of mental health issues associated to social media use has been well documented, and a number of studies suggest that increased use of such platforms can lead to lower self-esteem, and higher levels of anxiety and depression. My current project, Shame-sta-gram, seeks to critically reflect – through expressive typography and editorial image-making – the role of social media platforms in promoting an unachievable beauty standard.
Publication
Social media is carried out in the way of vertical scrolling, so I folded it the same way. I arranged this software in order with the method of telling stories and chose the method of printing with Riso. The covering part and special color of Riso are the charms.
The content of the work is the reason why social media makes people feel physically inferior. For example： guides teenagers in a very short time from very harmless topics such as healthy recipes… to bodyshame.”
