Press release of the competition jury for the selection of the Air Montenegro brand logo
With the competition for the Air Montenegro brand logo, the company To Montenegro preserved the sign of Montenegro Airlines from 1995, authored by arch. Đorđe Markuš (1935-2011), as a kind of cultural heritage of Montenegro. With the guidance of experts from the creative industries and the professional guarantee of the Faculty of Visual Arts, the airline announced a competition for a new logo at the beginning of April, which will be based on the redesign of the legacy sign.
The public competition (available at this link: https://www.gov.me/clanak/javni-konkurs) has set clear goals, rules and conditions in the tender. This contest is one of the few that, in addition to an inspiring theme, also provided participants with a motivating prize fund, comparable to the best guild practices in the region, which includes the purchase of a logo with a manual and a license for unrestricted use. With this competition, the company To Montenegro offered the professional public guidelines for improving competition standards in the creative industries.
The competition also set very specific and restrictive instructions, in order to preserve the legacy, dominantly in blue color, but primarily in form: The redesigned sign must retain enough elements of the visual code of the original MA sign to maintain a generative connection with it (eagle head in profile, with looking in the direction of flight, represented by the illusion of one stroke) and the like.
The result of such a prepared and implemented competition is a logo (design system) as a strong basis for building the Air Montenegro brand in the years ahead.
The author's work of designer Maksim Arbuzov fully corresponds to the objectives of the competition, because it preserved the tenacity of the original sign and added a modern character and media qualities to it, which will be a permanent support for the brand. The authorship is complete, even over the specially designed lettering, which as such does not leave any dilemmas in legal transactions.
The special quality of the chosen solution is a symbolic record of the specificity of the Montenegrin sky and climate. It is a simplistic image that reflects the rich birdlife, the gorgeous relief and the picturesque sky, which we all love so much. In addition to the iconic eagle as a kind of national symbol of Montenegro, by breaking the line we also got a bird that flies over mountains, seas, lakes and rivers, either at night, during the day or at dawn. The logo is sensory poetry that is just waiting for an adequate media performance.
And the media appearance has already started and leaves no one indifferent. Logo will welcome and see off passengers from the plane. The logo works equally well from close and from a distance. With its graphic mutations, the logo provided penetration both in high-end and in technologies of poorer reproductive power. The logo can be printed, projected, sewn, engraved, poured, animated, with sound...
The provided application idea additionally proves the quality of this solution. The author's interactive presentation is available at the following link https://readymag.com/maksimarbuzov/2820300/21/.
Due to the above, the jury, with the members' full consent, chose this logo as a solid support for the national airline's branding.
We must also point out that as a jury, we looked forward to every meeting and argumentative merging of our opinions, styles and affinities.
We would like to thank all the participants of the competition, as well as the family of Đorđe Markuš, who recognized our intentions. With the constant presence of his eagle, we had another and the most important member of the jury.
JURY IN COMPOSITION:
- commissioning member: Predrag Todorović
- expert member: Goran Ćetković
- expert member: Miloš Milošević
- expert member - guarantor: Prof. Nikola Latković Late, MFA
- expert member: Dr. Bojana Femić Radosavović
- commissioning member: Filip Radulović
- founding member: Draško Lončar