Zone Mixte

The zone mixte (or mixed zone in English) is the space where photographers and accredited media meet during major sporting events. A key place to build stories around competitions and capture landmark images. An area where female photographers are underrepresented.

With only 12% of women photographers accredited* at the Tokyo Olympic Games in 2020, Analog Sport and the Consulat Voltaire collaborated for the realization of the collective exhibition Zone Mixte.

Zone Mixte. Le sport dans l’objectif de photographes femmes features the work of eleven women with a professional approach to photography. It took place at Le Consulat Voltaire in Paris, and we were commissioned to create both the event poster and the exhibition catalogue.

We designed a poster using graphic lines inspired by various sports fields and equipment, creating imaginary playing fields as if viewed from an aerial perspective. The lines extending beyond the frame suggest that we are only seeing a part of them.

The bright and vibrant background is a reference to the lighting spots found on sports fields, as well as the bright flashes of camera equipment. These lights interweave within the letters of the title to both reveal and conceale it, symbolizing a yet-to-be-achieved diversity.

We used two fonts for the project, Authentic Sans by Christina Janus and Desmond Wong, and BBB Baskervvol from Bye Bye Binary, a reinterpretation of Baskervville, a revival of the Baskerville typeface, which serves a perfect exemple of the erasure of women in typography. Sarah Eaves, John Baskerville’s partner and associate, who continued the business after his death, was never credited for her significant contributions to typeface and print design (until 1996, when Zuzana Licko designed a typeface in her honor, Mrs Eaves).