Imagining Colour. Marks as Chromatic Figures of Thoughts

An instant and synthetic image, the mark is a sign that originates from a distillation, from the maximum concentration of the ‘very few’ features that it is made from. The hypothesis we are putting forward is that this peculiar, extreme synthesis, could be designed, in order to go beyond the traditional role of branding as mere ‘signal’ of a coordinated image. Retracing some of ours works experiences, we propose the idea that the design of a mark could be devised and structured with a precise intent to give shape to a thought; that such design may questioning – according to the specific modalities of graphics – the key questions of the ‘identity’ that the project tries to highlight. This paper outlines the stages of a specific line of research that is faced with the elusive dimension of colour – of its both sensitive and conceptual nature – to launch the graphic design toward possibilities that have been explored very little. Regulatory structure, organisational pattern of graphic signs according to a coherent inner structure, the mark is not (just) a ‘nice drawing’. Moreover, it is to be devised as the medium for an imaginative and conceptual synthesis that can be exploited, reactivated and reread, according to the multiple plans of its historical, theoretic and sensitive references upon which an identity project is developed.