Sarah Edmands Martin
DESIGNERAssociate Professor
University of Notre Dame
Sarah Edmands Martin
DESIGNERAssociate Professor
University of Notre Dame
Work
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Collegium Musicum
Poster design, identity design2023–2025
Poster design
This poster series was created for the Department of Music at the University of Notre Dame. The posters blend the historical with the contemporary in order to promote modern performances of the small Baroque and Renaissance vocal motet ensemble, Collegium Musicum. These posters both advertise individual concerts as well as establish a visual identity for Collegium’s performances. Each design was digitally collaged using Adobe Photoshop and Illustrator and was printed between 2023–2025.
This poster series celebrates the ensemble’s mission: reviving early motet music for contemporary audiences. Across the series, the repetition of historical imagery (medieval music engravings, Gothic cathedrals, blackletter typography, and Renaissance portraiture) remix modern design techniques (halftone texture, intricate hairline illustration, and structured layouts) in order to create a visual polyphony.
Concept
Musical staff lines, ledger lines, and notation-inspired elements structure the compositions, both evoking Baroque counterpoint’s rhythmic precision and blurring into hazy fields of layered depth. Restrained color blocking enhances contrast, bridging past and present. By re-contextualizing early music through digital collage, the series innovates classical music marketing, provoking engagement and discussion while making medieval, Renaissance, and Baroque vocal traditions visually compelling for modern audiences.
A vocal ensemble specializing in sacred and secular music from the Medieval, Renaissance, and Baroque eras.
Audience
The director of Collegium is Daniel Stowe, a member of the faculty at Notre Dame since 1993. The small vocal ensemble he directs specializes in sacred and secular music from the Medieval, Renaissance, and Baroque eras. The Collegium Musicum performs programs each spring and fall in the Reyes Organ and Choral Hall in the DeBartolo Performing Arts Center, and periodically in the Basilica of the Sacred Heart.
Every performance in the series for which a poster was created was completely sold out, with standing room only capacity of the music halls also being sold out.
Client
Sector
Discipline
Project team
Department of Music
University of Notre Dame
Promotional campaign
Arts & culture
Poster design
Sarah Edmands Martin