Better Words

Better Words, a hardback book by EVA International, offers an introduction to contemporary art and culture through the eyes of 8–12-year-olds. We worked with EVA to design and illustrate the book which features new artistic terms, words and word-forms, that describe many aspects of contemporary art practice and its response to social and political issues in today’s world. Better Words marks EVA’s year-long collaboration with schools, leading artists, curators, and arts writers. All of the new terms featured in the book were created through workshops with 150+ children across schools in Limerick, Ireland.

The brief was to design a publication that functions as a dictionary/glossary of new contemporary art terms developed by school children. We collaborated with EVA International to develop a design that explores the field of linguistic creation empowered by typography, colour and collages. The purpose of the typography is not just to deliver the content but also to explore new paths of meaning. We introduced different levels of hierarchical elements using colours, fonts, illustration and distortion to create a book that celebrates the children’s use of language.