Opinions, please!

As I mentioned in my previous post, we have to create three posters. I did my "mind map" (or brainstorming web), which was an intense writing session, where we just wrote words associated with the subject or word of our choice and highlighted the ones that struck us the most. It was a really interesting exercise because you never know where ideas/word associations will come from or where they will lead you. Plus, I get inspired as I write things down (one of the reasons I'm such an avid journal writer). From there, we started sketching and I developed six ideas, but am having trouble narrowing them down to one design to do. We did a group review and everyone expressed their opinions on which they liked best for each person. Fortunately or unfortunately, depending on how you view "you have a lot of good ideas," I did not get a resounding "that's the one" on a couple of ideas, just "that's cool and it will be interesting to see how it develops." Therefore, I'd appreciate your opinion on which ones to do, I have to select one of the six.

Below you will see the name of the play, a brief description about it (mostly what I could find out about it), the original poster, my brainstorming session, and my sketches along with some explanations.

1. "I Am My Own Wife"

This is the one we've been "encouraged" to do. It's a one-man show about this person that was a cross-dresser (man to woman) in the 1940s in East Berlin, who survived both the Nazi and Communist regimes of the time. He/She owned an antique shop and would hide other outcasts, but later became an informant for the Stasi.

My brainstorming web went off in the direction of identity and how others see us and how we see ourselves, then the element of secrecy came into play.

Ideas: 1) A man's head looking into a mirror and a woman's face looking back, showing that he/she's got a secret. 2) A man's head with the pearls (pearls are prevalent in every other poster for the play), again with the secret reference.

3) I don't think I'll use this one, I was just playing around, but it's s/he looking forward against a background of the Nazi and Communist symbol. 4) Just the lips and the hand over them, the lips would be made of the Nazi and the Communist symbols.

5) There is a really cool image of an eye on the internet with a transparent image over it, which I duplicated on the eyes here: one for the Nazis, the other for the Communists. 6) I just wanted to fill the last box, it's supposed to show the omnipresence of the regimes, but he/she is holding to her pearls and the perception with which she identifies herself.

2. "Chess"

This is about a chess tournament between an American and a Russian during the Cold War. From what I understood, there was a lot of manipulation, mind games, and propaganda. There's a love triangle with the American, Russian, and the woman manager from the American team, she and the Russian player fall in love somewhere around Act 2. Since it was during the Cold War, there was tension on and off the board.

My brainstorming web: As I did it, I got the thought of pawns on a chessboard and then thought about how the Russian and the woman were pawns and being played with. That, with the tension of the Cold War gave me an idea about using pawns and "games." I also thought about checkmates and stalemates, so I sought to incorporate the two.

Ideas: 1) A red pawn versus a blue pawn. 2) A more masculine-shaped pawn and a feminine-shaped pawn that are being put into a stalemate by two hands showing the manipulation that was going on behind the scenes.

3) A male pawn and a female pawn to show that tension, also seen are the hands that control them. 4) This is an aerial view of the board. You can see the two players arms--tense--waiting for the other one to move with the pawns in front of each other.

5) All the pieces are pawns, with two in front for the stalemate. It references the politics of the Cold War. 6) The four main characters (The American, Russian, Woman, and Russian Manager) in the play are all reaching for the pawn to take control of the game.

3. "Walter Cronkite is Dead"

Two women, one from a liberal state and the other from a conservative state, are forced to share a table in a crowded airport. At first there is tension as the two only see the surface of each other and their respective political and lifestyle views. As the play progresses, they begin to see that they have more in common than they originally saw.

I liked the idea of the two coming to know each other and overcoming their perceived differences, depicted as red and blue. But, I mostly played around with the two, one red and one blue, until I got something I liked.

Ideas: 1) The red woman and the blue woman shake hands and the handshake is purple to represent coming together. 2) The two women at the table with body language playing a bigger role--more open vs. more closed-off.

3) The left wall is red, the right wall is blue, and the floor is purple. The two women are shown in white. 4) The same concept as the other one, but the women are more abstract.

5) The two women are looking up at the "Departures" screen, which says the title of the play (I thought it was funny: departures-death, get it?). 6) It only shows the bottom half of the women with more stereotypical luggage: a backpack and duffel bag for the liberal and a briefcase or a designer bag and a roll-on suitcase for the conservative. The luggage contains the name of the play, one of my classmates liked this because of the idea of bringing their baggage along.

For the last one, my friend Peter also just gave me the suggestion of doing one woman (probably the abstract one) with a red and blue paint stripe across her.

Well, what are your thoughts? I have a couple that I like more than others, but would appreciate your feedback. Or, if you have a whole different idea, please feel free to share! The best designs are a collaborative effort, and I would appreciate any help or advice you have to offer.