Views and hues

Berlin-based graphic designer Liu Yang is known for her minimalistic style.[Photo provided By Taschen to China Daily]

Award-winning graphic designer Liu Yang tours China with her pocket series on connections, Mei Jia reports.

In her book Man meets Woman, Liu Yang reveals her understanding of gender perspectives: A couple sits silently on a bus. While the woman is wondering why her boyfriend is so quiet - could he be mad at her or does he have plans to dump her - running through her mind, the man is simply feeling sorry that his favorite sports team lost a match the previous night.

The book is part of a pocket-size series by the Chinese-German graphic designer, who has won the Red Dot Design Award six times since 2002.

The international award is given by the Design Zentrum Nordrhein Westfalen in Essen, Germany.

"Sometimes, you need to think from the other side to communicate better," Liu told her audience in Beijing during a book tour earlier this month.

The tour also took her to Chongqing, Shanghai and Hong Kong.

The series includes two other books - East meets West and Today meets Yesterday, with the former published in 2007.

The books combine pictographs and short captions, and have been published in different languages in many countries.

Liu is in a special position (in the world art scene) since her art is minimalistic and exudes simplicity, Florian Kobler, managing editor of Taschen, Cologne-headquartered publisher of the series, earlier told China Daily.

The apparent simplicity of her pictographs that display her deep and wide thought process drew Taschen to her work in the first place, Kobler says.