The Horror Show! catalogue

Hosted at Somerset House in London, co-curated by Iain Forsyth & Jane Pollard and Claire Catterall, The Horror Show! was a journey to the underbelly of Britain’s cultural psyche. The exhibition presented an alternative perspective on the last five decades of modern British history in three acts – Monster, Ghost and Witch. Recast as a story of cultural shapeshifting, each section interpreted a specific era through the lens of a classic horror archetype with thematically linked contemporaneous, new works and a survey of the counter-culture of the time. We were tasked with designing all 2-D aspects of the show. The graphics inside the exhibition, the marketing, publicity and the catalogue. Each one needed to fit seamlessly with the other and explain the complexity of the exhibition in a sympathetic form.

To accompany the exhibition, The Horror Show! catalogue is constructed with a unique, irregular concertina fold. When closed, this features a “Frankenstein’s monster” face, grotesquely confronting the viewer. Whilst once open and fully extended, it is revealed that the face is made up of photographs of artworks and cultural figures from in the show. This collaged cut-up is a metaphor for British society, consisting of the mainstream and counter-culture, the two constantly pressing and grinding against each other. The back of the catalogue features the main collage used in the publicity for the show, with the addition of a very important key, so that you understand who everybody is in the image.

Once you have opened the catalogue, you are confronted with three sections which, as in the show, are designed completely differently from each other with contrasting typography and paper stocks for each. The Introduction section is dark black and takes its styling from the combined spaces in the show. Monster puts on the stinking clothes of Punk DIY. Ghost is grey and washed out, never fully materialising on the page. Witch is bold, proud, modern and old – daring you to disagree.

The catalogue design needed to refer to the decades in the exhibition – the 70s, 80s, 90s and onwards but also be something very contemporary. This meant a selection of fonts which referred to the era of the ‘feeling’ of each section but were used in a contemporary way. They are thrown up against each other in ugly juxtapositions, symbolising how counter-culture needs to push into the mainstream to change us all and move creativity and society forward. The layouts also referred to this historical context. The Monster section is based on the 70s and 80s and is an updated version of the DIY punk fanzine. Ghost is ethereal, with typography almost not there. Witch is bold, alchemic, and strongly gothic but looks towards the future as much as the past.