With DESET!, visual artist Laura Snijders playfully investigates what a game without rules would look like. She got to work with the cards from the existing card game Set and added new elements of her own. She replicated the three shapes from Set – bars, ovals and waves – and stuck these onto the actual game cards. She then added extra cards, and even two game boards. She then observed how players played this new, undefined game. Snijders shares her findings in this idiosyncratic book.
Although her new game doesn’t have any rules, DESET! does in every way resemble a game instruction booklet – even if it’s rather large for a set of game rules. Using visual elements from the game in the body text is an essential measure in this respect, and is done to great effect. In a more general sense, the book exudes play. The five colours used in the Risograph printing process leap off the page and the choice of translucent paper creates a sense of layering that perfectly suits the material.
The cover feels somewhat estranged from the interior as the white of the textile-like cover material and the composition of coloured shapes filling the cover isn’t repeated anywhere in the interior. The plastic sleeve in which the book is packaged is complementary to the cover, with its stylised title and author’s name.