BREAKTHROUGH
PRIZE
Science Meets Hollywood
The annual Breakthrough Prize, aka the “Oscars of Science,” brings together luminaries of science and tech with celebrity presenters.
Held on the grounds of the NASA Ames Research Center in Mountain View, CA, the award ceremony is broadcast live on the Nat Geo Channel. Working with BW Architects, I designed environmental graphics for the annual awards show. I helped to visualize the theme “Seeing the Invisible,” by designing a language of extreme micro and macro views. To honor the laureates and their discoveries, I envisioned each of their scientific breakthroughs as a movie and designed its poster.
For more about the design process, see the case study.
Role: Art direction, environmental graphic design
Photos by Justin Weiner/BW Architects and Getty Images
SEEING THE INVISIBLE
To communicate a theme of seeing beyond the capabilities of normal human vision—both far into space and deep into the human body—I developed a series of supergraphics showing images taken with electron microscopes or the Hubble Telescope, in the iris of a massive human eye.
The macro-micro motif continued on the step-and-repeat wall for celebrity arrivals, with images of neurons floating across a background of space images.
SCIENCE FACT POSTERS
To honor laureates in fundamental physics, life sciences, and mathematics, I envisioned each of their discoveries as a movie, and designed its poster. The strategy was to frame each complex and advanced scientific discovery as a story, rather than a scientific illustration. This approach was enabled by using the visual language of film posters, which distill complex plots and characters into a single narrative image.
While developing the Breakthrough Prize posters, I worked through the design process in a sketchbook
For more about the design process behind the posters, see the case study
