A designer was inspired by physically-challenged athletes when he created the pictograms for the Beijing 2008 Paralympic Games.

 

The 20 logos were unveiled at a press conference Wednesday held by the Beijing Organizing Committee for the Games of the XXIX Olympiad (BOCOG), which coincided with the Month for Publicity for the 17th National Help-the-Disabled Day.

 

Hang Hai is an associate professor of the Central Academy of Fine Arts and chief designer of the Beijing 2008 Paralympics Games Pictograms.

 

"Before, I didn't know anything about the Paralympics. But as I got to know some physically-challenged athletes and their stories, I was moved many times," he explained. "So I just tried to convey the dynamics of their body movements through the pictograms," said Hang.

 

Following the design styles of the pictograms of the Beijing Olympic Games, the Paralympics Pictograms use the Chinese seal script as their basic form while incorporating the pictographic elements of oracle bone writing (jia gu wen, dating back from 14th century B.C.) and the bronze-ware script (jin wen) with the individual event.

 

The logo for wheelchair basketball features a stick figure seated in a wheelchair while getting ready to shoot the basketball.

 

Hang explained they chose the seal script as the basic from because it is graceful and liquid, which embodies Chinese traditional aesthetics. "The pictogram is a good combination of body movement and rich cultural connotation," Hang said.

 

"Pictograms must be easy to recognize even without captions, so we incorporated the charm of oracle bone writing," Hang told Chinadaily.com.cn. When asked if he had considered other Chinese writing styles, Hang replied the other scripts would have been too complex to modify into a pictogram.

 

(China Daily May 24, 2007)