Madison, WI-based designer and artist Kyle Tezak has been playing around with icons. He says, "Trying to capture the essence of an object or idea with only a few lines and at the same time maintaining its elegance is pretty much design in a nutshell. That’s what is so great about icons, they’re tiny poems. I decided it would be a fun project to attempt to sum up some of my favorite books, movies, historical events, anything, with just four icons; the meat and potatoes."

Besides being visually striking, clever, and pretty humorous, Kyle's project asks another question: what if you had to capture your whole story in four icons. Your entire life and personality in simple lines and basic shapes. What would you pick? The things you've accomplished? Your hobbies? Your loved ones? Career? Neighborhood?

It's only fair that I, too, would accept this challenge, so here are my results. I pulled the graphics from the amazing Noun Project, which seeks to collect, organize, and contribute to the "highly recognizable symbols that form the world's visual language, so we may share them in a fun and meaningful way."

Okay, yeah, so I'm no graphic designer, but that's not the point of Alex's project. Try it and post your results to our Facebook page: you'll find it fun, frustrating, perhaps even a bit meaningful. And isn't that was visual symbols are all about?

Happy editing!

2 Comments