“Can a font become an exhibition space in its own right?”

And the answer to that question

Forward! is (1) the seventeenth exhibition of the Korean Typographic Society, (2) a font created by 125 members and non-members of the Korean Typographic Society and AG Typography Institute, (3) an offline publication of the works and participants on paper, and (4) an online publication of the works and participants on the website.

While the previous exhibition, Vibrating Birds and Handwritten Letter, explored “time” through a typography video of science fiction novelist Kim Cho-yeop’s new work, Forward! explores “space” through fonts.

In the fonts we use all the time, there is a space for each letter. When we use fonts to write, program, or design, it’s no different than summoning the space in a font to our own space.

“However, like dingbat fonts or emoji fonts, which are composed of various symbols or images, each space in a font can be occupied by more than just letters. To remind us of the infinite possibilities of fonts, at the seventeenth exhibition of the Korean Society of Typography, we try to imagine another kind of ‘space’ - the exhibition hall. A space that is both offline physicality and online accessibility through fonts, while at the same time being typographically useful and functional.” (From the call for entries, ‘Hello, typography lovers.’)

Participants were each randomly assigned a space and asked to fill it with a graphic that symbolized ‘Forward!’ Just as each step forward creates yesterday, today, and tomorrow, and each letter placed forward creates a piece of writing, the participants’ works were created with a single font, and the font became an exhibition space in itself. Forward! can be downloaded from the exhibition website.