The idea is to die young as late as possible. — Ashley Montagu — Tuesday January 5th — —

“What art does — maybe what it does most completely — is tell us, make us feel that what we think we know, we don’t. There are whole worlds around us that we’ve never glimpsed.” Greil Marcus — Tuesday January 5th — —

I love listening. It is one of the only spaces where you can be still and moved at the same time. — Nayyirah Waheed — Tuesday January 5th — —

Yo + Yo by Yomar Augusto

Last month we discovered the extraordinary ‘Yo + Yo’ project by New York-based Brazilian typographic artist and graphic designer Yomar Augusto. The start of the new project leads all the way back to a period between 1960 and 1962, during which Augusto’s father was deployed to the Gaza Strip as part of the United Nations emergency force where he combined his work as a soldier with photography. The insightful images he shot there show the daily life inside the military compound, the region and numerous charismatic self portraits of the young lieutenant. As fans of vintage photographs with a beautiful weathered look these images really appeal to us to begin with, but Yomar’s vision to hybridize his personal talents with their shared passion for photography makes ‘Yo + Yo’ a next level project of a son who’s father died when he was 5 years old. Having printed the photographs on 1 meter wide paper, Yomar adds a distinct layer of both typography and graphics, giving the images a strong new meaning, both on the mentioned deep personal level, but even more as remarkable imagery with an extraordinary raw aesthetic.

My father passed away when I was 5 years old. This robbed me of the opportunity to get to know him as an adult and further of being able to inquire about the photos and his time in Gaza.
These images are a time machine of sorts allowing me to try to enter my fathers world during a time of conflict. Ultimately this project is about the connection of two generations that were never able to communicate to one another verbally or physically, until now.

Yomar Augusto is a very talented typographic artist and graphic designer from Brazil, based in New York City. Born in Brasilia and raised in Rio de Janeiro, Yomar initially trained as a graphic designer before going on to study photography at the School of Visual Arts in New York City in 2001. He then started his own studio in Rio before completing a Masters in Type Design at the Royal Academy of Art in The Hague, The Netherlands. Yomar then spent eight years living in The Netherlands and working in type, design and art, in both commercial and educational sectors. Yomar has also presented commercial and conceptual projects with solo exhibitions in Asia, Europe, North & South America.

Yomar also taught Typography for Advertising at the Willem de Kooning Academy in Rotterdam between 2011 and 2012 and at the Bauhaus University in Weimar, Germany. He has also held a number of experimental calligraphy and book art workshops in many countries, including Brazil, United States, Russia, Turkey, China, Denmark, Spain, Portugal, Germany and The Netherlands.

Through following Yomar’s Instagram it is clear there is more to come in the Yo + Yo project soon (after the first pop-up exhibition of the project in New York last December), so make sure to keep an eye out there and on the website here