M.A. in Creative Direction
B.A. in Communication Design
M.A. in Creative Direction
B.A in Communication Design
Created for the 300th anniversary of Immanuel Kant’s birth in 2024, this book reinterprets his philosophical work Perpetual Peace for a generation struggling to remain hopeful in a world that often feels on the brink of collapse. It speaks to those overwhelmed by the constant flow of news about war, hunger, and suffering; and to those who find it increasingly difficult to believe in a peaceful future.
The topic of peace is highly topical, and certainly the outbreak of violence in the Middle East and Ukraine and other parts of the world should not be downplayed. Nevertheless, this book shows the unmistakable course of history, namely that we are living in the most peaceful era our species has ever experienced.
This book is intended to be a glimmer of hope. In times of „doomscrolling,“ when excessive consumption of bad news on the internet is becoming rampant, conscious news consumption is becoming more relevant than ever before.
I compare the decline in violence from the past to the present, based on well-founded facts and figures from Canadian psychologist and cognitive scientist Steven Pinker, with the demands of Immanuel Kant in his philosophical treatise „Perpetual Peace.“ To this end, I analyzed a large number of diagrams and tables from Steven Pinker‘s work „The Better Angels of Our Nature: Why Violence Has Declined“ (2010) to illustrate the progress made in fulfilling Kant‘s calls for peace.
In addition to the finished product, a concept booklet was also submitted for the final delivery: this was printed exclusively on the backs of the outdated test prints. Thanks to the Japanese binding, the misprints are now slightly visible through the paper, allowing everyone to glimpse the rejected concepts and the process behind the final product. No new unused paper was wasted and the old test prints and designs were given a new purpose.
