Following the first year of the Tang Prize, Taiwanese design company Proad Identity was awarded the German iF Design Award for 2015 for the image scroll commissioned by the Tang Prize for use at the first award ceremony. Now, another Tang Prize design has caught the eyes of design judges. Chasing the Pearl, a book chronicling the competing designs for the Tang Prize Medal and Diploma, has itself won the 2015 Golden Pin Design Award for Visual Design Communication. Ten designers from Japan, Germany, Australia, England, Italy, the Netherlands, and Hong Kong were invited to submit their concepts for the Tang Prize medal, which would be bestowed to each laureate for their outstanding achievement; and fifteen diploma designers from Taiwan were invited to submit their ideas for the diploma. The entire competition was captured in this book, Chasing the Pearl, a presentation of the depths and heights of the art of design.
‘Chasing the Pearl’ takes its inspiration from Naoto Fukasawa’s design for the Tang Prize medal. His design, in form and feel, radiates a sense of movement as it spirals upwards and down, while evoking images of a dragon twisting and turning in flight. In the Chinese tradition, the theme of a dragon chasing after a pearl is an analogy for the endless pursuit of wisdom. Fukasawa’s winning design captures that very idea—life, bursting with energy and burning with curiosity, pursues knowledge through the infinite frontier of the knowable; altogether, it wonderfully encapsulates the spirit of the Tang Prize and pays tribute to the esteemed laureates.
As the diploma design changes per prize year, the 2016 design will be announced in May, just before the announcement of the next Tang Prize on June 18-21, 2016 and the award ceremony on September 25.
Read more at: Golden Pin Design Award