When walking into the Jacob Lawrence gallery, one is immediately presented with blank

white walls. With one such wall in front of me, the layout of the room encouraged me to take a

right and pass the information desk. Beyond this, one can walk into two large rooms with design

exhibits lining the walls. This layout created a sense of amiability, as one is immediately

encouraged to visit the information desk and talk to the person on duty, and then engage with

both the art and the other people in the large room. Even though the gallery itself is housed in a

small space, it has a grand feeling because the two large rooms consist of very little furniture or

clutter. Despite this feeling of openness, the individual exhibits are placed on the walls around 5

feet apart from one another, which made my observation of the designs feel like a more personal

experience.

While completing my walk around this gallery, I was drawn to a particular exhibit that

consists of seventeen look books, each with a different number on them. This exhibit was created

by a collection of students in classes taught Jason Germany, Annabelle Gould, and Axel Roesler.

There are two main ways in which the physicality of the space encouraged my vision to be

drawn to this exhibit. The first is white walls mentioned previously. Because the walls are such a

neutral color with little to no texture, they were not very interesting to look at. As a result, I was

inclined to look at the three-dimensional objects hanging on the walls themselves. The second

way the design of the room encouraged my observation of the exhibit was the lighting. The room

does have a central light, and there are no windows. Instead, there are soft spotlights mounted on

the ceiling that illuminated the exhibit. This is shown in figure 1, where the exhibit is bright and

the edges of the photo are dark. This drew my eyes to the light, and therefore to the exhibit. In

addition, this exhibit was on my natural path through the exhibit. While walking through each
room, I could follow a path around the outside of each room and I naturally ended up passing

this exhibit. This specific placement ensured that it would be seen by almost all visitors.

The exhibit itself is also designed to gather attention from an audience. As seen in figure

2, each notebook is hung at eye level for someone of average height such as myself. This not

only caught my eye very well, but also made it simple to interact with the exhibit. The audience

can flip through each notebook, and the placement of the exhibit on the wall made it very

accessible to the general public. Each notebook is also a bit oversized, which helped with my

visual understanding. The text within each notebook is in a very legible font, and the images

showed up clearly.

This accessibility of the exhibit aids the authors purpose, because as I flipped through the

booklet it became clear that students such as myself were the composer’s target audience. The

numbers on each notebook correspond to a particular class offered at the University of

Washington, and flipping through the pages showcase what each class is about. The first page is

a short description, and the corresponding pages offer pictures of the class and descriptions of

projects completed by students. This use of text and image are the two rhetorical modes

employed by the composer, in order to illustrate and explain the activities done in each class.

Because this piece is designed to be interactive with its audience, the composer’s purpose is to

inform students. Specifically, to let students know what classes are offered at the School of

Design in a creative way.

The composer uses multimodal elements to convey this message, including visual and

physical. The visual elements have been described above and can be seen in figures 1 and 2. The

physical element includes the three-dimensional design of the exhibit, and the various pages that

the audience can flip through. This use of multimodal elements not only helps the audience
interact with the exhibit, but also furthers the message of the piece. This is because a design

student created this exhibit, and the multimodal elements show the skills taught in the School of

Design. Rhetorical grammar also aids in the description of each class, by using phrases such as

“developing design concepts” and “interaction experiences” that portray each class as positive

and educational.

Figure 1

Figure 2