Light and Vision

The poster in question was made by Kazumasa Nagai in 1969 as the design for the Japanese version of the Life Science Library series. In the poster, there are many white circles of various sizes on a bright red and yellow background. The circles represent the two types of photoreceptors in the human retina, cones and rods, which help us perceive light and color.

Kazumasa Nagai designed numerous posters for the Japanese versions of Life Science Library books. The Life Science Library itself was a set of books that were published by Time Life from 1963 to 1967 and that informed readers about various natural science subjects. Moreover, Nagai is one of the founders of Nippon Design Center, established in 1960.

In my opinion, this poster is very interesting because Nagai makes an abstract image of a scientific concept. At first, people will just notice a set of white circles on a bright background, however, these shapes have a meaning of seeing and perceiving the light and colors. Therefore, the poster is an example of conveying a scientific topic without an illustration.