Potch.xyz is an online specimen of type designer Potch Auacherdkul. He marked a turning point for typeface projects by Huai which have been recognized by well-known type design competitions.
While attending the Maryland Institute College of Art (MICA) for MFA Graphic Design in 2016, Potch created a remarkable process-based typeface design research ‘State’ for the dissertation and became even more passionate about the letterform after graduation. This passion manifested itself in the completion of the Type@Cooper Extended Program in 2018.
Potch’s typefaces have been honored by the Type Directors Club, Art Director Club, STA Chicago, Morisawa Type Design Competition, amongst many others.
Nicha Keeratiphanthawong is a designer who creates a discourse between what is fleeting and flawed with the permanence of art, translating those remnants into graphical forms and decorative qualities.
Through collaborative projects rooted in the fields of art and culture, design, and exhibition-making, Nicha works alongside artists, curators, designers, researchers, and institutes. Her focus is on design research, spanning conceptualization, content handling, visual, and typographic treatment.
Education
MA, Werkplaats Typografie, Arnhem (ArtEZ, NL) 2020
MA, Information Design, Eindhoven (DAE, NL) 2017 foundation year
Recent Practice was founded between New York and Arnhem in 2020 by Potch Auacherdkul and Nicha Keeratiphanthawong, a studio practice offering Type design, Typographic research, and consulting.
Each design is an exploration of the role of letters and their analogous place in language, both as a medium for communication and artistic expression. As a Type Designer and a Typographer, our work is a constantly evolving and active process, involving observing, analyzing, and transforming thoughts and the nuance of language into designs for clients. We pay meticulous attention to how we can thoroughly communicate their core values while simultaneously expressing our design expertise through a variety of mediums, from printed ephemera to screen formats.
Recent Practice was founded between New York and Arnhem in 2020 by Potch Auacherdkul and Nicha Keeratiphanthawong, a studio practice offering Type design, Typographic research, and consulting.
Each design is an exploration of the role of letters and their analogous place in language, both as a medium for communication and artistic expression. As a Type Designer and a Typographer, our work is a constantly evolving and active process, involving observing, analyzing, and transforming thoughts and the nuance of language into designs for clients. We pay meticulous attention to how we can thoroughly communicate their core values while simultaneously expressing our design expertise through a variety of mediums, from printed ephemera to screen formats.
Our clients, commissioners, and collaborators range from the artistic and cultural fields to businesses and institutes. Apart from self-initiated projects, we’re also working with international like-minded collaborators, grounded in our mission to create an alternative working methodology as a global collaborative studio.
We’re here to help with your creative needs and are always open to new ideas. If you’d like to discuss a project or talk about how we can support you, kindly reach out. We’re excited to connect.
Awards and Features
Tokyo TDC Annual 2022
TDC 67 Type Design
TDC 65 Communication Design
2019 Young Ones ADC;
Bronze Cube
STA100 – 2018, 2020
Morisawa Type Design,
Honorable Mention
JosephBinder 2020 Finalist
Print Design Awards,
Regional Winner
ADC Young Ones, Gold Cube
TypeCon 2021
Typewknd 2021
Atypi 2020
LA Art Book Fair 2019,
Geffen Contemporary at MOCA
NY Art Book Fair 2018-19, MoMA PS1
Yale Art Book Fair 2018,
Yale Art Gallery, New Haven
Pentagram, New York
Galería Isla Flotante, Buenos Aires
Books(at)ret, Rotterdam
After8book, Paris
SKWAT/twelvebooks, Tokyo
Books Atelier, Tokyo
Post-books, Tokyo
Temporary Bookshelf, Helsinki
Design Academy Eindhoven
Werkplaats Typografie, ArtEZ University of the Arts
Type@Cooper, The Cooper Union
Maryland Institute College of Art (MICA)
Survival in the 21st Century
Custom typefaces and visual identity for the exhibition Survival in the 21st Century curated by Georg Diez and Nicolaus Schafhausen, Deichtorhallen, Hamburg, 2024
Image courtesy of Deichtorhallen Hamburg, photo: Henning Rogge
Emanuel Nine Memorial
A custom typeface for the Emanuel Nine Memorial honoring the clergy and members who were murdered at Mother Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Charleston, South Carolina. Commissioned by Pentagram, New York.
Hand-painted gothic inscriptions on the stained-glass windows of a church capture the solemnity of Pentagram team’s trip to Charleston. The expressive Gothic Textura Script is an homage to these Gothic scriptures and the organic scriptures drawn by a local artist.
The typeface can also be seen on the Memorial website and engraved on the Memorial fountain, a sacred space on the grounds of the church.
Image courtesy of Pentagram
Chittagong memorial
Chittagong Memorial is a remembrance book, immortalizing the shipbreaking activities in Chittagong, a seaport in Southeastern Bangladesh.
Based on data archives from the Ship Breaking Platform, the book acts as a historical window into 109 retired cargo ships and their fates with their undertakers through the eyes of typology. Each curve and dip of these letters illustrates stories of untold facts and figures behind the container ships, from their origin to their last sail before meeting their demise at Chittagong Graveyard. By shedding light on this period in history, it is easier to understand that the dismantling process and uneconomical operation led to problematic issues, such as poor working conditions of the shipbreakers and its lack of environmental awareness.
Alongside the typological research, the book was accompanied by satellite imagery showing the geographic landscape of the shipyard and the locations of the 109 ships docked onshore. The design research began at Rotterdam’s Maasvlakte area and was published in Eindhoven
Rosas Enigmas
An artist catalog with the lettering as identity
Published in March 2021, Rosas Enigmas is created by artist Rosario Zorraquin, curator and writer Rosa de Graaf, and designer Nicha Keeratiphanthawong. This online publication, seeks to provide a tangential context for Rosario’s art-making, which will continue to evolve over time. The audio-visual accompaniment is produced by Keeratiphanthawong, using footage taken by the artist and her collaborators.
Ellipsis after Closure
Ellipsis after Closure is set in a variable font ‘State’, and a display font ‘Ellipsis’ by Recent Practice
Following endless digital threads of information and being in constant touch with ‘hardware,’ it is easy to forget one’s bodily presence and situatedness. Weavings, just like computer coding, are complex automated nettings. Only the point of rupture—a dropped stitch, like a bug in the code, a systemic error—redirects the attention outside of the machine by requesting a manual intervention.
‘Ellipsis after Closure’ is a show in book form by Tabea Nixdorff and Nicha Keeratiphanthawong, with mended hole contributions submitted by participants who took part in hole mending meditation workshops in 2020.
The book has been selected by Tokyo TDC Annual Awards 2022
and featured in the annual book.
(image courtesy of books.at.ret)
Huai
Huai represents the culmination of research into the duality of influences between handwritten, vernacular Thai lettering and Latin typefaces. The result is a warm, expressive typeface that doesn’t abandon the human hands and the language that produced them.
Awards and features:
ATypI 2020
Joseph Binder Award 2020: Distinction/Finalist, Vienna
Priminister Awards 2020
STA100, a 2020 Design Competition
by Society of Typographic Arts, Chicago
TDC 67 Type Design Competition: Judge’s choice
by Type Directors Club, New York
TypeCon 2021
Typewknd 2021
Jasonhendrikhansma.com
Artist website for Jason Hendrik Hansma